Vélo'v is a

bicycle-sharing system A bicycle-sharing system, bike share program, public bicycle scheme, or public bike share (PBS) scheme, is a shared transport service where bicycles are available for shared use by individuals at low cost. The programmes themselves include both ...

running in the city of

Lyon Lyon (Franco-Provençal: ''Liyon'') is a city in France. It is located at the confluence of the rivers Rhône and Saône, to the northwest of the French Alps, southeast of Paris, north of Marseille, southwest of Geneva, Switzerland, north ...

, France, in conjunction with the

advertising Advertising is the practice and techniques employed to bring attention to a Product (business), product or Service (economics), service. Advertising aims to present a product or service in terms of utility, advantages, and qualities of int ...

company JCDecaux. It has been the pioneer of smart bicycle-sharing systems, previous systems being more ad hoc and run similar to a charity. The relationship with JCDecaux allows the city to provide the service on a

cost Cost is the value of money that has been used up to produce something or deliver a service, and hence is not available for use anymore. In business, the cost may be one of acquisition, in which case the amount of money expended to acquire it i ...

neutral basis for the city, and at a very low cost to users, in return for providing exclusive advertising access on bus shelters and the like. The primary aim is to reduce vehicle traffic within the

city A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

. The scheme also aims to reduce

pollution Pollution is the introduction of contaminants into the natural environment that cause harm. Pollution can take the form of any substance (solid, liquid, or gas) or energy (such as radioactivity, heat, sound, or light). Pollutants, the component ...

, create a convivial atmosphere within the city, and encourage the

health Health has a variety of definitions, which have been used for different purposes over time. In general, it refers to physical and emotional well-being, especially that associated with normal functioning of the human body, absent of disease, p ...

benefits of increased activity. Its name is a portmanteau of French ''vélo'' ('' bike'') and English ''love''. The first bicycle-sharing system to open in France, after the pioneering 1974 scheme in

La Rochelle La Rochelle (, , ; Poitevin-Saintongeais: ''La Rochéle'') is a city on the west coast of France and a seaport on the Bay of Biscay, a part of the Atlantic Ocean. It is the capital of the Charente-Maritime Departments of France, department. Wi ...

, its success inspired similar systems in major French and European cities, including Paris' Velib' in 2007. With the success of these two high profile smart bicycle sharing systems a new paradigm of government supporting bike sharing as a part of a public transportation network emerged. It is still the bike-share scheme with the second-highest market penetration (1 bike per 121 residents) in the world, after the Velib'.

Overview

The system began on May 19, 2005 and now provides over 3000 bicycles available from over 350 stations situated around the cities of

and

Villeurbanne Villeurbanne (; ) is a Communes of France, commune in the Metropolis of Lyon in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes region in eastern France. It is situated northeast of Lyon, with which it forms the heart of the second-largest metropolitan area in France ...

. The aim is to have stations within 300m of every point in the city. The bicycles can be returned to any of the 350 stations. Access is via a subscription system in which a card is purchased online or at a station giving the user an account and a PIN with which they access bicycles through a terminal situated at the bicycle stations. Rentals can last from less than 30 minutes up to 24 hours and are available to anyone 14 years and over holding a Carte Vélo'v (subscription card for the service), tourists can buy a 1- or 7-day card for the cycles using a credit card. The June 2006 edition of the Vélo'v newsletter reported that over 22,000 rentals per day were made by the over 52,000 subscribers to the service, an increase of 44% in a year, and representing 6,400,000 km traveled for the year. In 2010, Velo'v data was analyzed by a cross-disciplinary team, who found some interesting patterns, such as higher average speeds on Wednesdays, speeds that outpaced cars during peak hours, and an average trip length of 14.7 minutes. In 2017 there were nearly 25,000 daily rentals, more than 8 million trips in the year and 68,500 long-term subscribers. In January 2025, 2,500 new electric Vélo’v bicycles were introduced to complement the existing fleet of mechanical bikes, aiming to enhance cycling accessibility, particularly in elevated areas of the territory.

Bicycles

Vélo'v bicycles, along with a lock and basket, contain electronic components which allow the bicycle to be identified by the stations, allow tracking of kilometers traveled, tracking the condition of the bicycles, (lights, brakes, dynamo), and collection of detailed statistics about the usage of the bicycles.

Controversy

Despite its prominent presence in the city of Lyon, there have been multiple instances of discontent with tourists using their services. The company advertises a very low price to rent a bike for a short amount of time, but fails to clearly indicate that the user has to pay an additional fee per half hour of using the bike. Since the user gives Velo'v access to their credit card, the company can deduct this money without further notification. This, in combination with the absence of a clearly indicated e-mail address to contact the company, resulted in bad reviews on different platforms on the internet.

Video game

For the 2006 edition of the Festival of Lights, Lyon had been partly modelized in order to create a video game named ''Velo've raced in Lyon'', created by B2B Games. Pedestrians could play for free from 7 to 10 December and the game was broadcast on screens on place de la République.

References

External links