A person on a bicycle (illustration).

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Alexandre GELEBART / 20MINUTES

For latecomers who wanted help getting their bikes repaired, it is already too late.

The “bicycle boost” device will indeed stop this Wednesday.

Launched by the government in May 2020, at the end of the first confinement, it allowed individuals to relearn how to cycle (equipment, safety, advice, etc.) but also to repair their two-wheelers with assistance of up to 50 euros.

With this measure, the executive wanted to encourage cycling.

According to figures from the Ministry of Ecological Transition, the operation helped finance a total of 1.9 million repairs.

The French Federation of Bicycle Users (FUB) indicates for its part that 1,387,368 French have benefited from this aid, at 4,371 different repairers, for a total amount of nearly 109 million euros.

Dear rear wheel

If the operation was so popular, it is above all because having your bike repaired can quickly become expensive.

Asked by

France Info

, Slimane Djiddane, co-manager of Villovélo, specifies that “what remains reasonable is the brake where in general we change the pads and the cable, but the most expensive remains a complete rear wheel”.

On the site of the small sales and repair store located in the 18th arrondissement of Paris, in the braking category it is thus indicated that a cable and shoe change costs 12 euros.

A change of the headset is billed 36 euros.

But the big problem remains, for repairers, the supply of parts.

Didier Chalibert, the wholesaler who supplies Villovélo, indeed tells

France Info

that delivery times have exploded since the health crisis because 90% of production is in Asia.

According to him, "there is clearly between 15 and 25 weeks of delay on certain parts".

Faced with a damaged bike, you must now know how to be patient before being able to pedal again.

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