meet vancouver’s most-travelled shared bicycle in the mobi network
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hub director of campaigns and inclusion navdeep chhina at a mobi bike station at ontario street and e. 30th avenue in vancouver on dec. 5.
jason payne
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mobi bike no. 1079 took its first recorded trip on jan. 12, 2017, leaving the docking station on the seawall under the cambie bridge at about 5 p.m.
it was -2 c and dark. the bike went about one kilometre — probably along the seawall — to ontario street, where the trip ended.
the ride took about 4½ minutes.
since that inaugural trip, bike no. 1079 has logged more than 17,300 kilometres over 2,263 trips, giving it the distinction of the most-travelled bike in the city’s mobi bike-share network, according to a postmedia news analysis of system data published online.
(while the bike-share system launched in summer 2016, mobi system data goes back only to 2017.)
bike no. 1079 isn’t the only long-distance rider. nearly 90 bikes in the network have travelled over 10,000 kilometres since mobi took to vancouver’s streets.
all told, the nearly 2,700 mobi share bikes in vancouver clocked 21.4 million kilometres from january 2017 through september 2025.
navdeep chhina, director of campaigns and inclusion at hub cycling, an advocacy and education non-profit, isn’t surprised by mobi’s growing numbers. he said across north america there were 157 million trips taken by bike, scooter and other “micromobility” devices in 2023.
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“we know there’s a demand, and we also know that the demand has increased dramatically now that people also have access to electric bikes,” he said.
while bike no. 1079 has spent much of its time roaming downtown and stanley park, it has traversed almost the entire mobi network. it’s been as far afield as jericho beach in the west, commercial drive in the east and as far south as queen elizabeth park.
however, mobi’s network here is still much smaller than those in toronto and montreal, chhina said.
“the bike share in toronto has 1,042 (bike) docks with 10,250 bikes. and in montreal, they have 1,080 docks with 12,600 bikes,” he said.
mobi has 264 bike docks in vancouver with 2,692 bikes, according to public data.
mia kohout, ceo of mobi, said in an email that several factors have contributed to mobi’s steady growth in ridership, including expanding to new neighbourhoods and adding e-bikes.
the commercial drive neighbourhood was added to the network in 2019 and the university of b.c. was added in 2022, the same year e-bikes were added to the system — a “game-changer” according to kohout.
she said the company hopes to expand into southeast vancouver but has no plan for when that might happen. chhina said growing the network is one of the most common requests he hears from potential and current users.
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“people want it to cover a bigger region,” he said.
mobi bike #1079 at a docking station at ontario and e. 30th. this bike has travelled 17,300 kilometres, more than any other bike in the system.
jason payne
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both chhina and kohout would like to see a regional network developed that connects to public transit, similar to those in toronto and montreal.
kohout called montreal’s regional bike share program a “great example” of a system that is closely tied to the transit system.”
”bike share can easily be seen as an extension of the public transit system and provides a first-mile/last-mile solution for transit,” kohout said. “imagine if bike share was truly treated as public transportation and became a natural extension of public transit?”
chhina agreed.
“i should be able to pick up a bike in surrey, get on the skytrain, get downtown, jump on another bike here and get to my destination,” he said.
chhina said creating a regional system is achievable. he pointed to the north shore, where west vancouver and both the city and district of north vancouver created a single bike share network that allows users to move effortlessly between municipalities.
“in order to really make it accessible, we need to make a region-wide system,” he said.
in the meantime, kohout said mobi would continue adding e-bikes, expanding the network and “supporting any efforts towards regional bike share.”
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