Docking Hell

Riding around all the Barclays/TFL Cycle Hire Docking Stations in London

Docking Hell Logo Although I was an instant fan of the Cycle Hire scheme, it actually took me a little while to get signed up and travel on one of the bikes - but once I did, I quickly became a convert - even making a video about it for others new to the scheme - before realising that there was something that I need to do : Ride around all 345 docking stations, to see how long it would take.

Why? Well, because I'm known for travelling around all the London Tube stations, and so here was another brilliant form of transport in which you could set yourself the challenge of 'doing all', perhaps in the fastest time possible.

I created a Facebook Group - Docking Hell made for it, got some chat going about it on the borisbikes.co.uk forums, and planned my route. Before the event, I had several people interested - but disappointingly, come the week before and people found excuses not to go, pulled out, or hadn't signed up in time. Perhaps they'd seen and read about this other attempt where a team of guys had cycled round them all in twenty hours!

Saturday 18th September

In the end there were just two of us - myself, Geoff and my girlfriend Vicki and we started late and not in the place that I had originally intended! I had been all fired up to start on the western edge of the cycle hire zone (the docking station is at Kensington Olympia station) but in the end circumstances meant that we didn't start until ten thirty in the morning at the docking station at Tavistock Street, just off of Covent Garden.

10.22
Right then. To the Bikes! #dockinghell

So at 10.30 in the morning, I already figured in the back of my head that we would not get round them all .. but what if we carried on late into the night. Could we go cycling round into the early hours? So we would just start - see how many we could do, and make a decision as the day went on.

Bikes We pick up two bikes - mine is numbered 15323 and I instantly wonder that with only 4,000 bikes in the scheme at the moment, where did the numbering start at for me to be fifteen-thousand-and-something. And is there such a thing as Cycle-Hire Spotters? People that try to write down the numbers of them all to 'see' all of the bikes.

Vicki's bike has an anomaly - a big 'FUCK' sticker in the right font and colour, placed about the 'Barclays' logo on the back of the back. It seems several bikes have been vandalised in this way - and now we were going to ride around on it all day!

The first docking station to go to was easy - in Wellington Street, 30 seconds around the corner from where we were starting. "Number Two!" I shouted jubilantly, knowing that if they were all 30 seconds apart, then we could have them all done in under three hours. But they're not all thirty seconds apart ... We went out to Kingsway where we immediately encountered some people who were looking at the docking station trying to figure it out and we soon learned that seeing the bikes is still a novelty for some people, and you get asked a lot of questions by strangers when you're seen riding them.

I wanted to head to Regent's Park, so we went north - west a bit - and north some more, stopping off every minute or so picking them up as we went. Behind the British Museum and amongst UCL was where I saw my very first ever docking station - back in June when it had just been built - but no bikes had been delivered to it yet. It felt like coming 'home' to where first found out about the scheme.

11.22
Cycle ride! 10/345 complete. #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2pkv90

At Taviton Street I estimated that we'd done ten docking stations already - and that we were just under the half an hour mark, so we stopped and docked up for five minutes - meaning that our journey was free so far. It also gave us time to update our paper map that we were drawing as we went - and have an official docking station count. It was exactly ten, so I tweeted an update to that effect. We briefly spoke to a Scottish couple - a father and daughter who was a student at UCL about the bike scheme, before our five minutes passed - meaning we could take the same cycles out again and we headed off again. We pedaled hard and went west down the Euston Road round Great Portland Street tube station, and got a little lost going round in a circle findng a docking station around Marylebone High Street. When I thought we had got the docking station count to 20, we stopped again at a station on Baker Street - and as I looked up from watching the light turn green, I noticed a Starbucks across the road - it was time for a late breakfast!

Just as we were about to cross the road though, we were accosted by a lovely old lady who wanted to know all about the scheme. She said she was from America, but she sounded British to me so I quizzed her on this ... turns out she was English but she now lived in California and came back once a year to visit her children. "I don't know if I could come back to London now" she said with a chuckle in her voice, "I like America too much". "I love London too much!" I chirpily replied instantly defending the city I was cycling around today, before discussing whether she could sign up for the scheme or not - I wasn't sure, but later checked to discover that actually - yes- you do have to be a resident of the UK to get an access key.

11.59
Stopped for a tea! Baker Street. Heading for Regent's Park. This is going to take all day ...! 20/345 #dockinghell

In Starbucks over tea (not coffee!), we spread out the map again over two tables and planned our rough route and strategy for the rest of the day. We decided we would head up north, go round Regent's Park, then turn east and go all the way over the 'top' of the docking station areas down into Hoxton and Shoreditch and then drop down south somewhere.

If we stopped and docked every half an hour for 5 minutes, then we could do the whole day for free - or if we rode for up 60 minutes, it would only cost us a pound. I estimated if we did the six or seven times plus some half an hour rides, we could go all day and have it cost us not more than ten quid. I'd meant to bring my stopwatch so that I could time how long we'd been on, but I'd forgotten it. Instead, every time I checked the cycle app that I was using on my iPhone, I would make a note of the time and rely on that.

TFL don't make obvious on the offical website, but you can print out a 'receipt' that shows what time you took a bike out and what time you returned it - and the duration so that you can see if you'll be charged or not. At every point that we docked during the day, we used the terminal to print out the journey records of our progress.

Journey Records

Passing Marylebone Station on the outside was lovely - I've been inside the station loads of the times, getting a train to/from the tube, but had never passed outside it in the daylight to see it. Heading north towards St. Johns Wood, we passed Church Street - where a buzzing vibrant noisy market was taking place, with wonderful smells emanating out and awakening my nostrils. I wanted to stop and explore, but we had to cycle on. It was around here that we actually missed out on going to a docking station on Lilestone street, and it occurred to me then that if we missed one and I wasn't that fussed about going back and getting it, then we were probably going to miss out more later on - and then meant we weren't going to do them all in one day.

This was compounded a few moments later when we pulled up outside Lords Cricket ground with the queues of people there, and the red blob on the TFL map showing a docking station transpired to not be there in real life - the first, but not the last time today that the map would be wrong about the locations.

13:08
Riding to all the docking stations! 29/345 #dockinghell (the one outside lords cricket ground isn't there!) http://twitpic.com/2plsj5

At Grove End Road we got the docking station that is in the North West corner of the system. A guy was there failing to get the last bike out, and he turned for us for help as we pulled up. We concluded that it was broken and must have been registered for a fault, and there were no other bikes for him to take - and we weren't going to let him have ours either! instead we sat by our bikes, waiting for the five minutes to pass before undocking and carrying on our way.

Across the top of Regent's Park and it was annoying to see lots of 'No Bicycle' signs painted on certain paths within the park - officially you're meant to stick to the roads, but we saw other cyclists going about, so we joined them and made our way into the park, and OVER the regents canal ... I had no idea it was sunk down lower on a different level. Could we have cycled along if we dropped down? Maybe, but we had to get to the next docking station, right outside the entrance of London Zoo, where the last time I was here must have been thirty years ago as a child on a school trip. As we zoomed along east, I caught a glimpse of some giraffes strolling around in there .. paddock? Giraffock? Was is the name for the places where Giraffes hang? Whatever, it was a cool sight to see from a bike.

On the eastern side of Regent's Park we found Gloucester Gate. There are some incredible old houses and buildings here dating back to the 1820's and Vicky got excited when she realised that we were in area steeped in history. The geek bubbled up inside of her and made a note of where we were declaring that we was going to have to 'Google-up on' the area we were in when we got back to read up on it.

We headed east, and then north looping up and around Mornington Crescent station before heading back down south towards Euston where it was getting towards lunchtime.

"How much does it cost then mate?" came a cabbie-like sounding accent as we waited at some red lights Oakley Square. A guy - clearly a taxi driver from the way he spoke - but on his day off by the looks of things and out with his wife a two kids in his estate car instead was leaning out the window near me taking a interest. "It's free for half an hour!" I said, giving him a big thumbs up and realising that that was the simple answer and didn't mention the access fee. "Brilliant!" he said - genuinely excited - giving me a thumbs up back before speeding off.

13:57
Ok. This is an insanely brilliant way to see the sights of London. Come join us? It's not too late ... #dockinghell

At Doric Way we docked up, and had a quick count and I was disappointed that we'd only done thirty seven docking stations. That didn't seem like many for the amounts of cycling that we'd done, but they had been spaced apart quite a lot - from now on they would get more frequent.

14:02
Stopped near Euston for M&S sandwiches! 39 docking stations done. They'll get more frequent now though ... #dockinghell

Euston Station meant food - M&S Simply Food, and we got sandwiches for lunch and spread out our map and other biking paraphernalia on one of the picnic benches on the outside concourse to station. The sun was out, it was nice, and we plotted the next part of our route again in more detail. Our green pen that we were using to update our paper map died on us, so a quick dash into WHSmiths to get a new one made me realise that I'd lost my debit card .. a quick dash back into M&S where I'd left it in the chip and pin device from where I'd bought lunch made me a relieved man!

Refueled from our food stop we picked up the pace a little, and aided by the fact that the docking stations were now closer together we seemed to hit them with an increased frequency than what we had done before lunch. Three in quick succession around the Russell Square area felt good, "We can get the one at Coram's fields!" yelled Vicki to me, and we detoured to get another one added to our tally.

It got congested around King's Cross where I snapped this rather fabulous photos of a docking station right next the name of a certain sponsor - looks cool, whatever concerns you have have of the big corporate bank. Vicki - we noted - was still riding her 'FUCK' labeled bike.

Logo

We struggled to head east up Pentonville Road - our first hill of the day that I could really recall, and found at that moment that the app that I was using to help me locate docking stations was wrong - it was one side road out, and the paper map from TFL had it right as we ticked off the one on Rodney Street.

We crossed back over the main road and had a moment of utter glee as we freewheeled .. downhill as I held my arms out and shouted "Wheeeee!!" like an child as we went back down the hill we'd just come up. Too fast, too far in fact as I shot past Great Percy Street and Vicki had to call me back as we'd missed the turn.

Pink Bike Which meant going back up the hill! And it seemed steeper this time, and for the first time ever on a Boris Bike I used gear one - the lowest, and I was glad that it was there.

At the top, we stopped to catch our breath at which point something wonderful happened ... we saw the pink boris bike.

"It's the Pink One! Where did you find it?" I yelled at the guy riding it. "Just found it docked!" he grinned back, and then completely posed for a photo. As far as we know, there's only two of the pink ones in circulation amongst the 4,000 bikes.

At Myddelton Square we passed the grand St. Marks Church - I'd heard about it but never seen it before, beautifully tucked away in a part of London which I'd never have gone to on tube or bus, but here I was discovering it by bike - brilliant. We stopped after that at Claremont Street as we got to docking station number 50, stopping just before the hour hire mark so that we'd only be charged £1.

From there - to Angel, Islington and the congested Saturday shopping crowds were out in force, and I didn't really enjoy riding this part, I've never really liked Angel, Islington or the surrounding area and I was happy when we cycled on, getting out quickly, heading east down City Road towards the basins, and Shoreditch and beyond.

At the bottom of Graham Street, we came out onto City Road again, and the paper TFL map had a red blob on it showing us that there would be a docking station on the other side of the road - but nope, not there. There was a nice wide open piece of pavement and a flower bed that looked like it could be dug up and the prime place for putting one ... but not yet.

Meta Instead, we passed a procession of what looked like female-morris dancers obviously part of some wedding ceremony walking along the street. A weird orange car - looked like a mini that had been custom converted passed up the street up the hill, and we cut into Windsor terrace where we docked, and waited five minutes so that we didn't go over the half an hour and incur a £1 charge. I took a photo of Vicki taking a photo of me to tweet - ooh, we're so meta.

15:33
Still going! Riding all the cycle stations. Pentonville/Finsbury. 50/345 done. #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2pn6nh

And on into Hoxton where a huuuuge range of bikes were sat at North Road, actually two docking stations together - on my iPhone App, but not on the TFL map, and we headed into Hoxton.

16:04
Hoxton. 57/345 #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2pniff

Round by the huge Old Street roundabout we pulled up for a rest and a dock-count, but didn't actually dock the bikes. Instead we headed round the back streets of the City and Liverpool Street - officially St. Luke's and Shoreditch territory according to the map, making out way down to Moorgate.

I'm always fascinated by this part of town as it's alive and vibrant during the week because of all the city workers, yet at the weekend all the shops and business close down, and it feels like you're in a scene from '28 days later' - you're the only person alive in the whole world and the streets are deserted.

16:23
Old Street! 66/345. This is too much fun! #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2pnp8r

At Moorgate, we saw the sight of a docking station that was completely empty - nothing going on here either, I suspect left empty waiting for people to roll up to their jobs on Monday morning..

We headed East, along London wall to the docking station on the edge of Finsbury Circus - a popular place in the summer for the office workers to come out and sit and eat their M&S sandwiches.

Just as we're about to hop back on our bikes and cycle away from docking station number 73 for the day we hear this panted/exhausted shout of someone saying "STOOOP!" and we turn and see out friend Matt running towards us to join us. He'd been following my tweets all day, and had decided to come and join us as he'd signed up for the cycle scheme weeks ago but hadn't used it yet. And he'd tracked us down and hired out a bike to come with us!

17:07
Liverpool St. 75/345 have been joined by @matthewf_ #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2po5f2

When I'd originally planned to do this - there had been a whole small group of people interested and wanted to be involved in doing it. Come the actual day though - and people had either dropped out, forgotten to sign up to get their cycle hire key, or just plain not bothered to get back to me, who knows why? So suddenly, having Matt along injected a bit of energy into us all as there were now three of us and we sped on.

Gherkin We swept through St. Mary Axe and for the first time in my life I got to see The Gherkin up close - as apposed to just seeing it on the London Skyline. It was Open House weekend too today, and I think there were more people milling about here than usual having just gone for a visit inside the building.

We got a bit confused finding the next station, but found the gorgeous little Devonshire Square right off Bishopgate near Liverpool St. Station which I never knew was there. We were getting close to the 60 minute mark, so we docked up and took a break and plotted the next move on the map.

We decided it was time to head south - over the river for first time today and so headed for Tower Bridge, more scenic than London Bridge we figured.

We unintentionally missed a dock right by Fenchurch Street - we must have cycled right past it without seeing it, and around all through the swarms of people piling out of Tower Hill tube station, tourists everywhere. We got off at this point and walked a little bit - we had to, it was the only safe way to cross the busy main road over to where we could see the Tower Hill docking station, with the Tower of London making an excellent backdrop in the background.

Again on the map, there's a red dot here - where St. Margaret's Way meets St. Katherine Way just off to the north side of the bridge, but we didn't see it. Vicki had been here on foot the other day and said she couldn't find it either.

Over the bridge and left into a world of posh flats - flats that I've been inside where my friends Ross & Sharon used to live, built in such a modern way that it almost felt like staying in a hotel when I once crashed the night there.

"Are you a Doctor Who geek?" asked Matt suddenly and out of the blue as we rode up Curlew Street the the docking station. "I am .. yes", "In which case, which classic episode of Doctor Who was filmed here then?", he asked. but the excitement of Docking Station number 79 took over and I never did find out.

We doubled back a little down Tooley Street, and went down south and then west through the Borough.

Through a landscaped park with swings (that my mum would call a 'recreation ground') we came out into the burstingly lively Bermondsey Street, where some kind of local street fair was very clearly in effect. The road was closed but the security guard said we could go through if we get off and walked. Kids wandered about with painted faces, market stalls sold goods, drunk people lurched outside The Woolpack pub and I wondered if I was in Emmerdale for a moment. A hippy/grunge band had setup themselves on the corner, and a gothic looking girl was singing .. well murmuring really to herself, but with volume and twenty or so people in a crowd - clutching pints in hand - swayed from side to side, listening and watching.

Jubilee Gardens We had to meet Matt's friend at Waterloo soon, so we headed west, through the back of Guy's hospital, past the popular Miller pub and along Southwark Street where we picked off five docking stations all in a row - snapping a photo from a distance. The traffic is busy here, it's not very scenic and this was probably the least interesting part of the cycle ride all day.

At the docking station just before Waterloo Station, Matt's friend Joe is waiting for us, and after docking in view of the Millennium Wheel we decide it's time to grab a beer and some well earned dinner and went to one of the many pubs nearby.

18:29
#dockinghell update: done 91 of 345 cycle stations. How long will we carry on this evening? That is the question...

Pub Planning I charged my phone, lamenting Orange's terrible 3G network again and found I could tweet if I dropped to 2G instead.

We got the paper map out again and had a look at where we could go next - even though Matt & Joe weren't going to be joining us.

The pub was also really busy, took ages to get served, took ages to get us food and we left at the end feeling not that relaxed from the experience - not what we needed for the final push of two more hours to get as many done as we could.

I also had a strange moment here though, as I wiped by face with the palms of my hands, and it felt as if my face was wind swept - from the briskly cycled London air that had been hitting my face all day - it felt cleansed in a grimy London kind of way, most odd.

18:49
Consulting the map! In the pub! 91/345 #dockinghell http://twitpic.com/2pp47i

Fuck Barclays We leave Matt & Joe behind saying goodbye and go back to the docking station where we'd docked to see if we could re-claim the same bikes that we'd been on all day.

As we did, we passed a Serco man with his truck, loading up bikes onto his trailer for the night - oh no! Has he taken our bikes? Well yes - and no. Mine was still there - but Victoria's had gone - presumably because of the FUCK sticker which had been on the side, and so she had to grab another one.

19:00
Oh, and the bikes have lights, yes! We're going to go until about 10pm & see how many we've done. #dockinghell

19:01
ps. My bottom is sore from the saddle. About to get back on the bikes ... #dockinghell

19:02
But it is a truly brilliant way to see the city. Have seen many things today in London that i've never seen before. #dockinghell

Oh - and it's now dark, and we're thankful for the automatic lights that come on and flash all the time when you're riding - whether it's dark or daylight, except ... that mine weren't working! "You're not flashing" said Victoria as we rode through the Old Vic Tunnels - under the many tracks of trainlines that going into Waterloo station. We dodged around the graffiti artists - their spray cans of paint littering the road - as they did their art, and went in search of a docking station where I could change up my bike.

19:58
Having to swap bikes as lights aren't working. Grr. Five minute wait. :( #dockinghell 92/345

The one on Lower Marsh lane isn't there (it is on the map!) but I'd already read that it wasn't there yet - it's being built soon. Instead, we rolled up at the one round the corner from Lambeth North tube station, and I docked ... and then had to annoyingly wait five minutes before it would 'green light' me and take out another one - this time, the lights were working.

Eventually, my token came good to take the bike and we head south down the Kennington road, rather naughtily going on the pavement in part as the docking stations were on the that side of the road. At Kennington cross we missed our turn and had to double back to snag a couple back in the Lambeth area.

Round the one way system to get to Vauxhall and an amusing moment where I'm looking at the red blob on the map which tells me where the docking station is, and i'm looking in front of me in the real physical world and i can't see it ... until we go under the tunnel arch to find it there - it's inside the tunnel tucked away out of the elements - these boris bikes will never get wet whilst docked here. A scramble across the crazy one-way system + bus station that is now Vauxhall Cross to get to the station on the other side - and it's a small moment of joy, we've hit triple figures for the first time that day as it's docking station number 100.

20:29
At Vauxhall! and we're in triple figures .. 100/345 complete! #dockinghell

By now it's just a question of how many more we can get done before we get too tired so we consult the map - there's a whole load in the Pimlico area close together that we can hit, and I wonder if we can make half of the 345 - 172 would be nice, but I'm realising that even this would be unrealistic. But we'll keep going and see how many we can actually do..

At Lupus street in Pimlico, we want to dock as we're approaching the hour mark since we last did and we only want to be charged £1 - not more, but the docking station we get to is full - no worries, there's another around the corner but that one too is full! So for the first time ever we do the feature on the docking station terminal which extends your time by fifteen minutes, and we eventually dock up for five minutes at St. George's Street.

20:59
Getting lost a bit in the murky (but posh) depths of Pimlico. 104/345 #dockinghell

As we turn left onto Vauxhall Bridge Road heading towards Victoria we encounter our first bad traffic moment - because of the Pope's visit to London and Hyde Park - the road is cordoned off and a mean looking police officer guards the road. "Oh.. can bikes come down?" I asked politely. "Sure!" he says, and his face brightens not looking mean at all.

Why Vauxhall Bridge Road was closed off and not Belgrave Road I don't know, because it is chokka full of traffic as we come up it and try and get near Victoria station. We jump off on foot as the road is too crowded and join the pedestrians slowly shuffling along and around the corner.

Belgravia Square Into Belgravia - around the back of Sloane Square station - and some of poshest properties we have seen all day and towards Hyde Park, where the traffic is again very busy.

We go the wrong way around Belgrave Square Gardens to get the one that is on the eastern corner, and then up Grosvenor Crescent - missing the one there completely and having to turn back to get it and the traffic is again so bad that we don't bother to battle to cross the street to take a photo close up - and it's too dark for me to get a photo from this far away on the other side of the road, so it's the first and only time all day that I don't get a photo of the dock.

21:49
We're approaching Hyde Park. Pope traffic/congestion/police all over the place! #dockinghell

We cut down the wrong way of a one way private road round the back of the Laneborough hotel and cross with the pedestrians to Hyde Park Corner. It looks like the Pope thing is over now, and everyone is just battling to go home. There's a slight moment of confusion as we try to work out if the docking station is inside the park, or just outside. I haul my heavy bike up some non-bike-suitable steps to find it just inside and dock .. and we are done for the day.

21:52
And we have docked for the last time today! We're stopping. Consider this as #dockinghell, Part 1. We will go out another day - part 2!

Vicky gets out the map, and we plot where we've just been and have a final tally : it's 117 docking stations out of 345, which is 34% - one third. And immediately I realise that we've then got to do this two more times, Docking Hell Days 2 and 3 to get the rest of them done - the ones that we've missed, as there's no way I'm not going to say I haven't done them all.

21:57
I have a GPS trace (.gpx) of my entire day! Will be imported into Google Maps or OSM tomorrow. #dockinghell

21:58
Final tally: 117 out of 345 docking stations! That's 34% There may have to be a part 3 as well! Interested? @geofftech me. #dockinghell

We jump on the Piccadilly line and head for home - it's all of a sudden very strange to NOT be on a bike. Vicki is knackered and instantly falls asleep, but i'm less tired - my mind is buzzing with that blue cycle hire logo in my head, and I'm looking at the map, already working out a vague route that would get us round another third or the rest of the docking station again next time.

I figure next time we can start earlier - about 8am, and do the same thing : Go on a Saturday and ride for about ten hours with breaks in between and try and do at least 100, maybe more. And after that perhaps there'll have to be a third day to finish them all off so that I can say I've been to all of the docking stations.

Boris on a Bike Stats

Start: Tavistock Street, Covent Garden.
Finish: Hyde Park Corner.
Docking Stations Visited: 117 out of 345 (33.9%)
Start time: 10:41, Finish time: 21:46
Time on bike: 393 minutes (6 hours, 33 minutes)
Cost: £6 (SIx periods of up to an hour at £1 each, four period under half an hour: free)
Miles ridden: 30.8
Average speed: 4.7mph

Map

Here's the complete map for the day - the data taken from my Garmin GPS plotted onto a Google Map - click to be taken to the map itself.