Bozo Bozza bashes bike borrowers

With apologies to readers and tabloid news editors. Apparently, Boris Johnson's Transport for London had a cunning plan: bicycle hire. Quite why the private sector is incapable of providing affordable cycle hire is beyond me, but anyway, TfL is going to provide cycles for hire. Nice idea, you might think.

The plan is to provide docking stations for cycles around London; to which end, TfL announced, last week, that in order to encourage point-to-point travel, the following conditions would obtain:

1. A deposit is required, non-returnable in case of theft.
2. No locks would be provided.
3. Anyone caught locking a hired cycle up would be fined £150. (Times)

As a fairly keen cyclist, I know a thing or two about what makes a good cycle hire scheme. And this I know: potential customers are unlikely to be attracted to the idea of being banned, in effect, from protecting their own money.