Publicly shared bicycles have recently come into widespread use as convenient means of transportation, especially within crowded cities, where automobile parking spaces are expensive and difficult to find, and where privately owned bicycles tend to obstruct pedestrian passageways when parked, and are difficult to secure against theft.
The publicly shared bicycle is typically locked to a bicycle rack by a lock mechanism released upon insertion of a user's credit or debit card into a card reader. The user deposits the bicycle in a similar bicycle rack at his or her destination, and is charged accordingly.
The user of a publicly shared bicycle will often need to carry various articles, which cannot readily be carried on the person while operating the bicycle. A backpack can be used for this purpose, but backpacks that can be worn comfortably while operating a bicycle have very limited capacity. Many publicly shared bicycles, for example those provided by the Public Bike Sharing Company (PBSC), have luggage racks that are composed of a rigid frames that extend upright from brackets fixed to, and extending forward from the bicycle's steering column. Small containers such as purses and messenger bags can be placed on the forward-extending brackets and secured by attaching their straps to the upright frame. Larger containers can be positioned forward of the upright frame. However, securing these larger containers to the frame so that they do not come into frictional contact with the front tire of the bicycle is difficult.
There is a need, therefore, for a large-capacity article carrier that can be conveniently fitted to the upright frame of a bicycle luggage rack as described above, and that can be readily removed and used by the rider to transport its contents while walking to and from the bicycle.
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