Be on the cutting edge of intra-city travel; forget motorized transportation and bike it. You’ll get some exercise, help out the environment and skirt traffic jams all for the swipe of a credit card.

More than 165 cities around the world offer bike-sharing programs.  From Denver to Tel Aviv, bicycle sharing is easy as 1-2-3. Stop into a bike-sharing station, select a bike and swipe your card for rentals by the hour, the day or the week. You can even pick up a bike at one station and drop it off at another.

The first truly successful bike-sharing program debuted in 1974 in La Rochelle, France.  Currently, Hangzhou, China holds the top spot with the largest bike-sharing program in the world — more than 60 service stations and 50,000 bikes. And there are programs throughout Europe, Asia, the Middle East and Australia.

In the United States, a 2010 survey showed bike-sharing programs operating in Denver, Minneapolis, Chicago and Washington, D.C. Today, you can rent bikes in dozens of U.S. cities including, Miami, Kansas City, Nashville, San Antonio and Boston. In July 2012, Anaheim became the first city in California with a bike-sharing program, and plans are underway for Los Angeles to follow suit. Watch out New York City cab drivers, the Big Apple will launch its own bike-sharing network in spring 2013.

Pedal on!