A Sydney eastern suburbs council has finally lost patience with dockless share-bike companies and will impound bicycles left abandoned on roads and footpaths.
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Mayor John Wakefield has called on neighbouring Sydney councils to follow Waverley's lead after the council last week unanimously supported a motion to impound any abandoned or unattended bikes.
Council workers will start impounding the bikes from Monday.
"We want them to clean up their act and operate properly," Mr Wakefield told AAP on Thursday.
The move comes after six Sydney councils agreed to a set of guidelines in late 2017 which aimed to ensure bikes weren't abandoned after oBike, Reddy Go, ofo and Mobike launched in Sydney.
The City of Sydney, Randwick, Waverley, Woollahra, Inner West and Canada Bay councils agreed to give the companies three months to adhere to the guidelines.
NSW Transport Minister Andrew Constance on Thursday backed Waverley Council's tough new stance. He hopes the other councils will follow suit but so far none have said they will.
Randwick passed a motion on Tuesday calling for a public tender to licence two of the bike-sharing operators, a spokesman told AAP on Thursday.
They'll have to provide suitable docking stations for bikes.
Woollahra council is sticking with the guidelines adopted last year.
"Council continues to closely monitor the effectiveness of these guidelines and if issues with dockless bikes continue or worsen then updating the guidelines will be considered," a spokesman told AAP.
ofo insists it wants a collaborative approach between councils and operators.
"ofo doesn't shy away from proper regulation and we are already working very closely with councils," the company told AAP on Thursday.
"We understand that the concept of bike-sharing is new. It's on us to provide education campaigns that provide riding guidelines and codes of conduct for our customers.
"We're doing exactly that - but changing behaviour takes time."
Reddy Go is open to finding ways to stop users vandalising bikes including state government-run education campaigns and support from police, a spokeswoman said.
CP Lim, head of oBike Australia, says it's "unfortunate" a minority of users are vandalising the bikes but insists a maintenance team is sent out at least twice a week to repair and remove any bikes that have been dumped.
Mobike has been contacted for comment.
Australian Associated Press