OBIS (Optimising Bike Sharing in European Cities) was developed as a result of the ‘Big Bang’ in bike sharing – namely the start of Vélib in Paris and Bicing in Barcelona in 2007. With the help of European funding from the Executive Agency for Competitiveness and Innovation (EACI) within the Intelligent Energy Europe Programme, the project gave 15 partners from nine countries the opportunity to assess BSSs all over Europe. OBIS started in September 2008 and ended three years later in August 2011.
The aim of the consortium was to: share knowledge; collect relevant information about more than 50 schemes; carry out innovative demonstration activities within the participating countries; and first and foremost, compile and publish the results of this intensive work to share it with all relevant stakeholders in the field. Thus the OBIS consortium hopes to provide decision makers, municipalities, practitioners, operators and cycling enthusiasts with a useful handbook to encourage the implementing and optimising of BSSs all over Europe and worldwide.