In October, I wrote about a bicycle parking locker the Brooklyn startup Oonee installed by Grand Central Station.
Now, the company’s founder, Shabazz Stuart (cool name, isn’t it?) is taking his idea “on tour,” if you will. Yesterday, the parking pod was brought to Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, where it will remain for a month. Following that, it will go across town to the Lower East Side and Union Square before crossing the bridge in June to Stuart’s home borough of Brooklyn, where it will spend a 29-day “residency” on Vanderbilt Avenue—near Barclays Centre, Atlantic Terminal and the Brooklyn Academy of Music. Finally, it will trek up to my home borough—Queens—and my neighborhood, Astoria. At each location, the city’s Department of Transportation will grant access to a spot on the curb for 29 days.
The mini pod is free to use but requires an Oonee membership, which allows access by a key fob or mobile app.
Although its scale, at the moment, is small, Stuart calls it “ powerful step forward.” He notes that this pilot marks “the first time any big city in the United States has had a secure bicycle parking facility on the curb.” He plans to expand his idea to other parts of the city and to cross the Hudson to Jersey City and other parts of the Garden State.
