Researching bike parking/storage for a condo association

[ny biker]

I live in a large garden-style condo association. Which means it encompasses a whole neighborhood of townhouses and small apartment buildings (2-3 stories, 4-6 apartments per building, one or two bedrooms per apartment), all built in the early 1940s. The buildings are clustered in courtyards, with parking lots in the middle of each courtyard. I'm on the committee that handles parking and transportation issues, and we've been asked to look into a storage facility for bikes. As I understand it, it would be a place for people to keep their bikes if they don't want to store them inside their homes or on their balconies.

I'm wondering if anyone has been involved with setting up or maintaining bike storage for a group or people, like at an apartment building or commercial building.

Off the top of my head I can think of lots of issues -- how many facilities we need and how many bikes they should store, what they would consist of, how to keep the bikes secure, how to allocate space fairly if there are more bikes than storage, liability issues if bikes are damaged while they're being stored...

A related issue would be adding some bike racks around the community, like at the pools, tennis courts and community center. I think this is easier.

I'm going to contact some local cycling advocacy organizations, but I'd also love to hear any ideas and advice you all might have.

Thanks very much in advance!!!

[Blueberry]

Depending on the type of storage, should it be free, or should there be a small monthly fee (i.e., if you did covered bike lockers). A small maintenance area would be cool too (our local WF has done one - bolted down pump and a few tools).

Good for you for doing this!!

ETA: Interesting link (http://www.duponteast.org/Bicycles~295403~19786.htm)

[shootingstar]

For places I've lived (condo) with shared locked bike storage, if there was a fee it was rolled into the whole fee for whole building.

But then I don't know if there ever was. It was simply part of our common amenities.

I wouldn't get hung up on this but it will cost something to set it up in first year.

After living in 3 buildings with bike parking, advice as follows:

*have keyed or security card access
*can have it caged but that's better in secured indoor car parking area
*bike racks be on ground, not forced to hang up bikes. Lots of people can't deal with that. I can't.
*if too many bikes pile up you might have to do a cull by notifying everyone in building that everyone pick up a tag to attach and claim their bike. Rest not tagged be set aside for a few wks., then donated. (this will happen.)
*keep it simple
*park at your own risk with key, etc.
*bike owners be advised to lock against bike rack within bike locker or caged area

[shootingstar]

It would be more desirable if the bike locker shared area would be integrated with an existing type of building structure so it's sort of "disguised".

[nuliajuk]

I used to work in an office building that had a locked chain link bike enclosure in the underground parkade, taking up one full parking stall. This enclosure had wall-mounted hooks and could hold about 25 bikes. So, if there's a parking space free, that would be one place to put a bike shed.

[shootingstar]

The majority of people will not always have light bikes. Some of the bike geometries also make it difficult to hang or to cope with quickly, with permanently installed bike baskets, wide handlebar, etc.

[Catrin]

I've heard so local stories about bikes being stolen from seemingly secure apartment/condo bike storage and know a couple this has happened to. How about video security?