I spent last August almost-exclusively getting around on Bee Bikes, Greater Manchester’s short-term cycle hire scheme, to see if they’re a viable alternative to the bus or tram. With 224 stations and hundreds of bikes available to hire for as little as five pence per minute, they promised a healthier, greener, and cheaper way to move across the city centre and suburbs nearby. Ultimately, I came to the conclusion there were too many pitfalls in Starling Bank Bikes, as they’re officially titled, like locking bicycles and then being fined. But I was prepared to give Bee Bikes another try in the spring, especially given Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) and Beryl, the company it sub-contracts to run the scheme, took on board my feedback. Never miss a story with the MEN's daily Catch Up newsletter - get it in your inbox by signing up here So starting in March, I returned to two wheels. Typically, I’d use the bike for destinations away from a tram line, or needed two buses to reach. Peel Park was a frequent destination for a Saturday morning Parkrun, as was Piccadilly railway station when engineering works severed the line from St Peter’s Square to Piccadilly Gardens, meaning I could only get to my train by walking a decent chunk of my Metrolink journey. But all that came to an end on a rainy Sunday evening three weeks ago. Arriving at Piccadilly from a delayed train from London, I just wanted to get home as quickly as possible. The next bus was a good walk and more than a half-hour’s wait away, and taking the tram would mean walking to Market Street. Both also required a walk from their destination stops to home. Despite the downpour, it seemed like a cycle ride was the quickest, and driest, way to get home. So I barrelled down station approach to one of the nearest Bee Bike stations to Piccadilly, on London Road. There were no bikes. Undeterred, I trudged through the wind and rain to Kampus, where a stand outside Pollen had two cycles free, the app said. Neither were available to hire, I found out by trial and error message. Another stand within sight, closer to Vimto Gardens, had a new electric Bee Bike parked up. Avoiding the ever-growing puddles, I tried it, but it wouldn’t unlock. I was getting drenched and desperate at this point, so I tried one more station on Chorlton Street in the Village, where again there were two bikes, according to the app. There was actually one, and again, it wouldn’t release the back lock. Join the Manchester Evening News WhatsApp group HERE By this point, I’d spent more than 20 minutes trying to find a bike and probably had walked further the distance from Piccadilly to Market Street, which I was trying to avoid in the first place. At this point, with damp feet and my faith in the Bee Bikes diminished, I half-jogged through Chinatown to get the tram from St Peter’s Square. On the way, I deleted the Starling Bank Bikes app in frustration. While I was fed up, I can’t say I was surprised by my odyssey in finding a bike. I’d noticed some of the same issues in the lead up to that June Sunday, which wasn’t a major event day like Parklife or Soccer Aid. In the weeks before, I’d been fined £30 for not locking a bike properly. I was refunded swiftly after going through the app’s customer service portal, but it was a hassle and stressful. I’d also seen the app overestimate how many bikes are at each station while I stood at said stand, sometimes saying there were two or three, when in reality only one was available. That’s a new problem Beryl hasn’t seen before, a spokesperson said. Some larger stations, like outside Central Library, were completely empty. And frequently, I found that if a station only had a small number of bikes for hire, they were usually those out of action. That’s because those bikes are usually awaiting collection from a roving Beryl van doing three daily maintenance patrols, which also try to redistribute cycles to meet demand. And demand has surged, with TfGM saying ‘ridership is up by 30pc in the last year’ and it had ‘a record number of rides in May’. That’s a good thing, as more Mancs take the healthy option to get around, which also cuts congestion and pollution. But to keep growth going, more bikes will be needed. TfGM is rolling out 300 new electric bikes, but they will replace existing stock, not add to the fleet. A spokesperson for TfGM added: “The increased demand for bikes has meant that both standard pedal bikes and e-bikes require maintenance and repairs back at the depot more often. “As always, our priority is to get bikes back out on the network as soon as possible to ensure that there are plenty for people to use and we continue to work closely with Greater Manchester Police to reduce levels of anti-social behaviour and missing bikes.” It’s good to see so many getting on two wheels this summer, but for the moment, I won’t be joining them.