DMCI Homes partners with student advocacy group UP Bike Share

real estate developer DMCI Homes recently partnered with student advocacy group UP Bike Share to promote the growing bike-sharing community at the University of the Philippines in Quezon City.

DMCI signed a memorandum of agreement last April 8 in UP Diliman with UP Bike Share and donated 40 bicycles to help the advocacy group accommodate more students who want to get around the campus in an environment-friendly scheme.

The agreement was signed by DMCI assistant vice president for marketing and customer care Jan Venturanza and UP Bike Share president Miguel Laperal. Witnessing the agreement were UP chancellor Michael Tan, UP vice chancellor for community affairs Nestor de Castro, College of Engineering dean Aura Matias, and UPBS officers Ryan Abis and Miguel Mercado.

Now celebrating its first year, the UP Bike Share is a non-profit student organization that aims to help students get around the 493-hectare UP campus and at the same time promote clean, reliable and sustainable transportation through  the bike-sharing system.

The group consists of 24 students from the colleges of engineering, fine arts and architecture who pooled their own resources to produce the initial 30 bikes that currently serve the students enrolled in UPBS.

"In bike rental, only one person gets to use the bike for a certain period of time ,while in UPBS, once the student leaves the bike at a building and goes to class, there will be other students in that building who can use the bike. That allows the bicycle to become more efficient," Laperal said.

He added: "Right now we are running an efficiency of four to seven riders or students in one bike per day.  For 30 bicycles, we can say we get to help at least 150 students in a day.  And we welcome the additional 40 bicycles from DMCI Homes as it will serve more students.  We truly value their support in our projects."

Aside from developing the bike-sharing community in the campus, the UPBS also plans to extend the system outside the university particularly in rural areas.

DMCI Homes' tie-up with UPBS is part of the real estate company's corporate social responsibility project Kaakbay sa Kalikasan.