Tampa community's bike sharing has multiple benefits

Four adults — two women and two men — rode through the quiet back roads on identical bicycles, cream-colored earth cruisers with red piping.

They reveled in the cool morning breezes, marveled at the sight of two sandhill cranes and enjoyed the serenity. One of the men cycled out front, snaking from side to side like a schoolboy who had just been let out for the summer.

Couples on a countryside vacation? Friends exploring some idyllic New England town?

How about me and three other Times employees taking a turn on the Winthrop community's latest transportation addition — community bike sharing. It was easy, given that our Riverview bureau sits in the development near the corner of Bloomingdale Avenue and Providence Road.

Spontaneity and curiosity prompted us to hop on Winthrop's "community bicycles" near Bike Works and go out for a spin. Of course, I called it research. And yes, I was the guy out front. Halfway through, I got so giddy I started singing.

While leisure activity is not discouraged, the ultimate design of the bike-sharing effort revolves around making it easier for Winthrop residents to get around the community and to work without their cars.

Winthrop founder and developer John Sullivan is such an ardent supporter of cutting down on car traffic that he went before the HART board Monday to discuss creating a park and ride stop for bus commuters near the new Brandon Advantage Center.

With the center set to break ground later this year, Sullivan envisions more than 100 spaces where folks could park and then take a HARTline bus into Tampa.

Winthrop residents, however, will have another way to get to the center, which will rise in the back of the development.

Bicycles.

"We want a transportation system that people can make the most of," Sullivan said. "Sometimes, the difference between riding a bus is 'How do you cover that last mile or two between the stop?' You can make it on a bike.

"It's exercise and convenience, but I think it's going to become more prevalent in cutting car traffic."

Sullivan, who strives to bring "new urbanism" to Winthrop, got the idea from the mayor of Fryeburg, Germany, who he says has increased cycling in that city by more than 20 percent since implementing a similar program.

Eventually, Sullivan said he would like to pair the bikes and mass transit to create a transportation system that would allow Winthrop residents to go from two cars to one. That's not only environmentally friendly, but simply cheaper when you factor in the cost of car payments, gas, maintenance and insurance.

Winthrop officials maintain the bikes, and Bike Works employees periodically pitch in. They are stored unlocked in recycled racks made from the parts of stolen bikes that could not be rehabbed.

"Hopefully, that serves as a metaphor for the bikes not being stolen," said Sullivan, who added that the development has a system for keeping an eye on the bikes.

Over the last year, Sullivan has sporadically placed the bikes out on the property. Now, they're here to stay.

And, apparently, they're popular. Eight people who either work or live at Winthrop used the bikes last month to ride down Bloomingdale Avenue to the Barn for the development's St. Patrick's Day party.

That's just the distance — a little too long to walk, but too short to drive — that Sullivan believes the bikes will complement.

And I believe they're going to be perfect for my occasional morning forays.

That's all I'm saying.