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The recent proliferation of bike share schemes (BSS, also known as public bicycle use programs) in many cities has focused attention on their potential for reducing motorised traffic congestion, improving air quality and reducing car use. Since 2005, hundreds of bike share schemes have been implemented in many cities, with bike share usage patterns monitored in many of them. This paper assesses the development of BSS and provides a rationale for their potential health benefits. The key research question, as yet unanswered, is whether BSS themselves can contribute to improving population health, particularly through increasing population cycling, which would increase population levels of health-enhancing physical activity. This paper presents a framework for evaluating the contribution of BSS to population physical activity, and uses examples of new data analyses to indicate the challenges in answering …