It’s now a full month since New York City unveiled bike share and I wanted to update an earlier post on the subject and share my experiences with it so far.

As stated earlier, I’m not interested in trips down busy thoroughfares where vehicular traffic dominates the path of travel. I’ve been seeking out mostly-protected bike lanes where interaction with cars is limited.

I have two favored routes and typically alternate between them for variety. The first is the ride down the Hudson River Greenway. I pick up a bike at 52nd Street and 11th Avenue and cruise down along the river to a rack next to Stuyvesant High School. It’s not as scenic as you might think given its proximity to the river. Noise and emissions from the West Side Highway diminishes the experience although the approach to One World Trade on a clear day is a pretty awesome visual. I’ve found there to be an occasional undersupply of bikes at 52nd and 11th and an oversupply at the Chambers rack but if you just wait a minute or two, another rider will equal out the imbalance.

I first experimented with another route when I first got back from Europe and I was waking up real early. One morning at about 530 AM, I pulled a bike from a rack where Sixth Avenue meets Central Park. I wasn’t sure what to expect once I got into the park but it was very bike friendly with a powerful array of scenery. As I grew more confident about navigating the park, I started going later in the day when it got more crowded. I still don’t have a handle on which portions of the park are closed to vehicles at which times, but the bike lanes are such that pedestrians actually are a bigger hurdle to the ride. A second rack with 58 bike slots at the southeast corner of the park has just opened making both the pick-up and drop-off easy. The tree density is such that it’s a full ten degrees cooler inside the park on a hot, sunny day.

Never have I become so attached to Central Park. Rather than appreciating from afar with the occasional walk on its outskirts, I’m able to get into the heart of it now with a bike. I can stop at any number of turn-offs and get turned on by the sights.

Complaints about bike share’s technology quirks are mostly unfounded in my dealings with it over a dozen rides or so. In one instance, my favorite rack on 52nd was inoperative with a glitch but I walked a few blocks away and found a functioning one. Over time, I’ve become more familiar with how the actual bike works too. The seat is fully adjustable and the three-speed gear shift is seamless.

Co-existing with other bicyclists who move at varying rates of speed is a challenge. I take it slow unless I have a bunch of daylight in front of me. In the Park, bike-pulled carriages occupy lots of space and sometimes use the bike lanes. Guys dressed like Lance Armstrong are high in number up and down the river. I find myself taking peeks for bike traffic behind me occasionally to brace for the high-speed pass by Tour de Speedy-types.

What I don’t understand at all is the anti-bike share sentiment I read in the papers since it debuted. Worst of all are those with their own bikes who resent the new influx of enthusiastic bike share users who are easily identifiable given the distinctive color of the shared equipment. The esteemed author Lionel Shriver did one of those Andrew Goldman Q and A’s in the Times mag a few weeks ago and complained that bike share bikes would get in her way and “colonize” the Hudson River Greenway. As if she owned the route. What Shriver and the more hardcore bike riders with regular routines pre-share need to understand is that the success of bike share will lead to improved future opportunities for all bicyclists.