A job that’s one big balancing act

Do you ever feel you’ve been juggling too many things, trying to balance too much stuff at work? 

Tray Duffy experiences that every day at his job.

“The trick is, balance that dance,” he said. “It’s moving around the city, pulling bikes, dropping off bikes.”

Duffy works with the rebalancing fleet for Indego, Philly’s bike-share program. 

“Full is bad, because a person who has a bike can’t return it and has to go somewhere else, out of their way, to dock their bike,” he said. “Empty is bad, because then a person can’t get a bike there.”

Fifteen hours a day, seven days a week, Duffy and his colleagues serve an 8-square-mile area that’s stocked with 650 bikes at 70 stations.

“The area is from Berks Street in the north to Tasker in the south, and from the Delaware River west to 44th Street,” he said. “I haven’t kept track of how many miles I clock, but the day goes very fast.”

As he covers that wide area, Duffy said he feels like he’s an ambassador for the program.

“The drivers are the face of the bike share,” he said. “We get the questions from everyone who’s passing by, both users and just the general public, who are interested in bicycles, and those blue bikes.”