It's a little easier to go "green" now that a group of UC Berkeley students instituted a bike-share program, one of the first to appear in colleges around the nation.

Green Bike Share is a student-run non-profit organization that was founded this year, which seeks to increase environmental, social and economic sustainability by renting out bicycles to the UC Berkeley and city community.

The program's rental stand, which set up shop yesterday, will operate every Monday, Wednesday and Friday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. next to the Cal Student Store on Lower Sproul Plaza. Students are able to rent bikes for two days for $2 and for three days starting on Fridays for $3, said UC Berkeley senior Molly James, director of communications for the organization.

"Physical health, reduction of carbon emissions, sense of community-bicycles benefit all these things," James said.

The program has been running on the Internet since this summer, James said. Green Bike Share currently has a fleet of 20 bikes. Organizers said they expect a shipment of new bicycles by next week and hope to have a total of 100 by next year.

The group is operating on $10,000 of UC Berkeley grant money won in a campus-wide contest last spring for improving student life. It is seeking about $65,000 in funding from local businesses and city and university grants.

Other college campuses with similar bike-share programs include Drexel University and Pomona College.

UC Berkeley senior Justin Wiley, co-founder of the program, said the bike-share is only the beginning of what he hopes will become a larger campus and community-wide bike hub that may be in place by next year.

"When it all comes together, we see a bicycle hub on Lower Sproul that includes Green Bike Share, BicyCal and a place for cyclists to repair their bikes," he said. "BicyCal will be an on- and off-campus outreach program about why we should be riding bikes that will give materials and teach people to build their own bikes for free."

Students who visited the stand said they are excited about Green Bike Share.

"(The program) is really cheap and it's such a good way to share resources and green our planet," said sophomore Amy Purvis, who was renting a bike after her own was stolen. "And you don't have the responsibility of owning a bike yourself."

According to UCPD, an average of 200 bikes are stolen annually from campus, at a value of nearly $80,000.

Green Bike Share said that it will take full responsibility for stolen bikes if the renter provides proof that they were properly locked up, Wiley said.

Locks and lights are given free of charge with bike rentals, and though Wiley said they do not rent helmets because of sanitary issues, they sell them for $10.

The overall philosophy of Green Bike Share is to promote the use of bicycles, even if riders do not use the program, said junior Brett Thurber, a program director.

Thurber said he was happy that the program could introduce people to biking.

"Just getting people on bikes is what's important," Thurber said. "As long as people are riding more, especially in these tough environmental times, that's what's important."

Tags: BICYCLE