Public-bikes scheme mooted for Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford

Cork, Galway, Limerick and Waterford are in the running for a public bikes scheme similar to Dublin Bikes.

A series of meetings will take place in the cities to gauge interest in the scheme.

Dublin Bikes proved to be one of the most successful bike rental schemes in the world, with more than 55,000 subscribers and more than two million journeys since it was launched in September 2009.

Now Cork, Galway Limerick and Waterford are in the running for their own bike rental schemes.

The first in a series of meetings will take place in City Hall in Cork next Monday.

A key part of this exploratory series of meetings will be to determine how the scheme could be funded.

It is not yet known whether outdoor advertising, which helped to fund the Dublin Bikes scheme, would play a role in the four other cities.