Talk about a service gall.
Eleven days after the city was blanketed with a foot of snow, fewer than one-quarter of Citi Bike docks are cleared of snow — but instead of offering discounts to members or promising prompt snow removal, Citi Bike is apparently sending "swag" to the lucky few "winter warriors" who have been able to use their memberships and urging them to post bike-aganda on their social media accounts.
On Thursday, a Reddit user revealed that he received a message from Lyft, praising his "resilience" in the face of bitter cold, and teasing a swag-bag to come.
"As a 'thank you' for your incredible resilience, we want to send you a special swag package filled with some of our favorite things," the message read, according to reddit user happy10345 in the r/lyft channel.
Swag? A Lyft-branded shovel? Some road salt? A burly worker to come dig out a dock?
Lyft is also imploring its "winter warriors" to create free content for the multi-billion-dollar app company, presumably to change the narrative due to some bad press about the snow response.
"We’d also love to celebrate your winter warrior status — if you’re out on a ride, snap a photo, tag us on social media, and let us know how you’re staying warm!" the message read.
The storm and the subsequent cold weather has left hardened snow around the 2,400 Citi Bike docking stations city wide — fossils to the company's tardy effort to make the entire system usable.
And the Citi Bike app has been no help. Users are shown a sea of available bikes and empty docks, but arrive to stations to find the bikes ossified in snow or can't return a bike because the dock itself is inaccessible. This extends rides, since users have to go to station after station to dock a bike, which can lead to higher profits for Lyft, which prices by the minute.
Under Lyft's contract with the city, Lyft, not the Department of Transportation, is responsible for clearing snow from its infrastructure. A city official, who requested anonymity, said they were stunned that Lyft was doing such a bad job on clearing snow because it's in the company's financial interest to make as many bikes available as possible.
As early as last week, it was clear that the company had not taken snow removal seriously. Streetsblog put out a video exposing the situation, and other outlets followed with stories questioning the company's service output to its paid members.
Citi Bike prices increased on Jan 6. Members in New York City pay $239 per year for unlimited access to regular bikes, plus an extra .27 cents per minute for e-bikes. The current membership fee is 151 percent higher than it was in 2013, while over the same period, inflation has raised prices 37 percent.
(Citi Bike blamed its most-recent price increase on "increased operational expenses, including the impact of rising tariffs." The company did not comment for this story.)
Clarence Eckerson Jr., who makes documentaries about street design for Streetfilms, suggested on X that Lyft give members a discount, since the service they are paying for is not fully functional.
"I really think at the very least @CitiBikeNYC should consider a 2-week free extension to anyone with a membership," the post wrote.
