Quality recycled bikes with locks are checked out from participating businesses. Users keep the card and use it to check out a Yellow Bike from any Yellow Bike Hub. The coalition outfits many hub bikes with baskets or carriers and takes care of records and bike maintenance for the hub. Residents of Zurich, Switzerland, can trade their passports in exchange for use of 21-speed hybrids for the day. Businesses who host such a hub gain small advertising on the bikes, benefit their public image, and increase traffic to and from their stores.
Typical participants are coffee shops and alternative grocers.
The Hub concept has revitalized a dying program. Losses are down, and the program has expanded to provide long term loans, free bikes for special events, and corporate fleets. The Minneapolis City Council even recently provided funding to the Coalition to expand into more inner-city districts. But the Coalition's most important contribution is its positive legacy. UConn, Portland and dozens of other American cities had already proved that it's impossible to protect an investment in free transit when nobody has an interest in defending it.