What do you get when you cross car rentals with time sharing?
Car sharing, a program designed to give people low-cost access to communal cars while reducing the number of cars in congested areas.
It works this way: A company or agency owns, maintains and insures a fleet of cars, trucks, vans or other vehicles strategically placed for access by car-share members.
Members pay an application fee and refundable security deposit to belong to the program ($525 in one program), and are given their own set of keys to a nearby vehicle that they share with others on a reservation basis. They pay only for the time they use the car, plus a mileage fee.
It can cost less than car ownership, especially for people who drive less than 10,000 miles a year and usually need a car for a day or less.
One estimate shows that car sharing can save a driver $2,166 on the routine operating costs of a new small sedan if they drive less than 2,500 miles per year. And that doesn’t include the insurance, maintenance, cleaning and repairs. Some car-share programs also give people access to a variety of vehicles.
Car-sharing has become popular in Switzerland and Germany, where it was pioneered about 10 years ago. There are about 40,000 European car-share members using 3,000 cars in more than 700 towns. It has also grown in a number of Canadian cities, including Quebec City, which has 200 members sharing 20 cars, in the last few years.
A pilot program has started in Portland, Ore., and another is being planned in Seattle, the sixth-most congested city in the nation. Others are being devised for Los Angeles and San Francisco.
Car sharing is billed as a way to ease traffic and reduce auto emissions and other environmental problems, while giving residents an alternative to car ownership or public transportation.
Only a small percentage of the motoring public takes advantage of driving alternatives, such as car pooling and public transportation, said John Shadoff, manager of the Transportation Demand Management Center for the State of Washington Department of Transportation. Moreover, he said, the state is spending $4 billion for a rail system in Seattle that only about 3 percent of area residents are expected to use.
Conrad Wagner, who founded Mobility Carsharing Switzerland in 1987 and has been a consultant to several programs on the West Coast, said it has been successful in Switzerland because of the good public transit systems.
David Brook, general manager of CarSharing Portland Inc., the company that began the program there in February, said it’s designed, he said, for areas “that have good bus service, good neighborhood shopping, so you don’t need to get into your car every time you need to go to the store.
“Two things make it attractive,” Brook said. “One, they can save money, if they don’t drive much. Two, it’s good for the environment” by reducing the number of cars on the road.
But, he noted, part of it is a lifestyle choice. “We have two sort of major target groups: People who don’t own a car or philosophically don’t want to own a car, but they do need the mobility and . . . I think, car sharing can provide an alternative to owning a second car.”
The Portland pilot is being run by a private company, but with startup funds from a federal grant to determine whether this will become a good transportation alternative.
“We’re not in a hurry,” to increase the number of car-sharing programs in the U.S., Wagner said. For now, it’s more important to study how the pilots work in several cities before they can “intelligently transfer the European experience to the American market,” he said.
Ideally, he said, car-sharing programs should operate on the same set of standards as such franchise businesses as McDonald’s or Hertz, so people know they’re going to get the same service, no matter where they go or what vehicle they share, he said.
There are no plans to offer such a program along the East Coast, though its congestion and environmental concerns seem to make car sharing a natural for places such as Boston or Washington. (Experts say it wouldn’t work in an area as congested as, say, Manhattan, because there’s plenty of good public transportation and very limited parking. However, it could work in the outer boroughs, they said.)
But, as Lee Beliveau, director of marketing and transportation for the Rhode Island Public Transit Authority noted, the West Coast frequently takes the lead on environmental and transportation issues, so it’s just a matter of time before it is offered here.
“When they get the bugs worked out,” Beliveau said, “I see us as being able to try it out.”
But others in New England have adopted a wait-and-see attitude. As Bob Murray, spokesman for AAA of Southeastern New England, said: “It’s one of those things that’s on the fringe. There’s an entrepreneur for every new type of program that comes along.”
A program in San Francisco, STAR, for Short-Term Auto Rental, was begun in an apartment high-rise about 15 years ago, giving the 2,600 residents access to 53 vehicles. Though the program had waiting lists for participants, it failed in part because the residents weren’t properly screened for credit risks and cars weren’t dependable enough.
But with the right screenings and the right cars, this type of program should work, Shadoff said. It costs far less than standard car rental programs, in which people are charged by the day or week, in addition to taxes, insurance and fuel charges.
“In a car share, insurance comes with the vehicles, and it’s just paid for on an hourly and mileage basis, so it works perfectly for short-term use,” Shadoff said.
Shadoff said he first heard of car sharing about three years ago, when Wagner, the pioneer of the Swiss program, was visiting the West Coast trying to drum up support for a program there.
“Some of us got really turned on about it,” Shadoff said. They invited Wagner back to discuss with state transportation officials what he was doing in Switzerland, and little by little, people seemed to become interested, he said.
Then the concept hit the political arena and took off, Shadoff said. “Some of the elected folks who are into transportation got excited about this, both for the potential of being kind of an inner-city transportation service for people who primarily use the bus and maybe to alleviate traffic.”
They also thought it would be great for the suburbs or developments, including apartments and condominiums, where residents might not need their own cars.
Shadoff said his department sold the idea because studies showed that people who car sharing drove up to 50 percent less than they used to, cutting down on the number of cars on the road. That’s because they planned their driving time better since they had to reserve the vehicle.
Shadoff said he got involved in the project because he had access to grants to come up with programs to improve the transportation system, including alternatives to car pooling and other developed ideas.
In Portland, Brook and his partner, Richard Katzev, a retired psychology professor who now runs a consulting firm, seized upon the project as the latest move in energy conservation.
They have nearly a dozen people signed up for the fledgling program, paying a $25 application fee, a $500 refundable security deposit and $1.50 per hour of driving time and 30 cents per mile.
They also ensure that a backup vehicle is available. If a vehicle isn’t available at the reserved time, the company provides a free taxi ride up to $100. The person who kept the car beyond his or her allotted time is liable for that $100 fee.
They hope to have a fleet of cars available to a 50-block area around Portland within the first year, in addition to cars at many high-rise apartment complexes. They may even offer electric vehicles in the future, according to customer needs and demands.
They figure their break-even point is 200 members sharing 20 cars, a goal they have set for themselves.
