Divvy: City-Owned Bike Share & Open Trip Data
Chicago owns Divvy: CDOT bought the bikes and docks with $18 million of federal air-quality money in 2013 and still owns them; Lyft only operates them. The 2019 exclusivity deal pays the city $77 million over nine years and caps fare rises at 10 percent a year — above that, CDOT must approve. A 45-minute member e-bike ride is capped at $6.
Live
📅 since 2013
✔ Editor-reviewed
📊 Impact
6.8 million Divvy trips in 2025, the system's highest annual ridership, on a network that reached all 50 wards in 2023 and about 1,136 stations across Chicago and Evanston.
🎓 Lesson
Owning the hardware is what buys a city leverage. Chicago bought its fleet with federal money and can pull any fare rise above 10 percent to the table; New York, which pays nothing, says it cannot touch Citi Bike's prices until its contract ends.
Evidence🏛️ Official
Scale🏙️ City-wide
Cost$18M federal CMAQ grant at launch; $50M Lyft capital investment from 2019
FundingFederal CMAQ grant plus city tax-increment financing at launch; since 2019 Lyft capital and sponsorship, with the operator paying the city $6M a year rising 4% annually, $77M over nine years
Sources
↗ Divvy — About (operator)The ownership sentence the entry turns on: 'Divvy is a program of the Chicago Department of Transportation (CDOT), which owns the city's bikes, stations and vehicles.' Also confirms Lyft manages operations, that start-up capital came from federal congestion and air-quality grants plus city tax-increment financing, and the 2016 extension into Evanston.
↗ Chicago Sun-Times — City Council makes Lyft exclusive operator of Divvy for nine years (10 April 2019)The contract terms: nine-year exclusivity, a $50 million investment in new bikes, stations and hardware, $77 million to the city over nine years earmarked for transportation projects, and at least $1.5 million a year from advertising. Carries the price-control clause verbatim: 'Lyft would be free to raise bike-sharing rates, but only up to 10% per year. Anything above that must be approved by the Chicago Department of Transportation.'
↗ Chicago Sun-Times — Divvy prices increasing nearly 10% in February (8 January 2024)Shows the cap working as a ceiling the operator rides up to: rises of 'nearly 10% — the maximum yearly hike allowed without requiring city approval', a third consecutive annual increase. Confirms Divvy for Everyone stayed at $5. This source dates the contract 'through 2027'; other reporting on the 2019 amendment implies 2028, so the entry does not assert an end year.
↗ Divvy — Changes to bike and scooter prices in 2026 (operator)Current price schedule, effective 11 March 2026: member e-bikes $0.19 to $0.20 per minute with 'Rides between 31' to 45 minutes capped at $6.00'; classic bikes $0.20 per minute after the included 45 minutes; day pass to $19.90.
↗ Divvy — Pricing (operator)Full current fares: single ride $1 plus $0.20 a minute, annual membership $143.90 ($99 for new and lapsed riders), non-member e-bikes $1 unlock plus $0.44 a minute, and the $5 Divvy for Everyone annual membership for qualifying residents in Chicago and Evanston.
↗ Divvy — Data License AgreementThe licence deed, and the difference from New York: 'The City of Chicago owns all right, title, and interest in the Data', not the operator. It grants a non-exclusive, royalty-free, limited, perpetual licence for any lawful purpose but forbids hosting, streaming, publishing, distributing, sublicensing or selling the data as a stand-alone dataset, bars data mining, and bars correlating the data with customer identities.
↗ Divvy — System data (operator)What is actually published: monthly trip files with start and end time, start and end station and rider type (member, single ride, day pass), with staff trips and trips under 60 seconds removed, plus a live GBFS station feed.
↗ Sustainability — A Tale of Two Divvys: The Bicycle Sharing System of Chicago (peer-reviewed, 2024)The independent counterweight, and the source for the $18 million CMAQ launch grant, the 2015 start of the $5 Divvy for Everyone membership and the 2015-16 expansion into Englewood, Humboldt Park and North Lawndale. Its verdict on the Lyft era: the system, 'refocused on more profitable e-bike and e-scooter rentals in privileged neighborhoods, may contribute to systematic exclusion of poorer neighborhoods and less privileged residents of Chicago.'
↗ Block Club Chicago — Divvy to add over 200 stations, from downtown to the Far South Side (17 March 2026)Currency check: 6.8 million Divvy trips in 2025, 'the system's highest annual ridership'; over 200 new or upgraded stations in 2026; unlock fees removed for trips starting in Equity Priority Areas on the far south, south, west and northwest sides; Divvy for Everyone still $5.
↗ Wikipedia — DivvyTimeline cross-check: June 2013 launch, the operator chain Alta Bicycle Share (2012-2014), Motivate (2014-2019) and Lyft since 2019, city payments of $6 million a year rising 4 percent, and 1,136 stations across Chicago and Evanston as of November 2025. Note it gives 750 bikes at 75 stations on day one where the peer-reviewed paper says 100 stations; the entry claims neither.
📎 Cite this project
1001 Smart Cities (2026). “Divvy: City-Owned Bike Share & Open Trip Data” — Chicago, United States. The Smart City Atlas. https://1001smartcities.org/projects/chicago-divvy-bikeshare/ (last verified 2026-07-26). Data: CC BY 4.0.
The underlying data is free to reuse with attribution — see the open data page.
🔗 Related projects
🇺🇸 Citi Bike Docked Bike Share & Open Trip Data · New York City
New York owns none of its bikes and says it cannot touch the fares; Chicago bought the fleet in 2013 and caps rises at 10% a year.
🇺🇸 Bluebikes: Bike Share Owned by Thirteen Municipalities · Boston
The one-owner version: Chicago's CDOT owns Divvy outright and negotiates with Lyft alone — no regional council in between.
🇩🇰 Bycyklen: Tablet-and-GPS Bike-Share · Copenhagen
Copenhagen's fleet died with its operator in 2022; Chicago's outlived three — Alta, Motivate, Lyft — because the city owns the bikes.
🇨🇦 Bike Share Toronto: city-owned bikes, contracted operator · Toronto
Toronto owns its fleet through the parking authority and sets fares directly, with no negotiated cap on rises.
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