Zipcar founder Robin Chase on why sharing is good
What's better: everyone owning their own car (which sits unused for 22 hours a day) or everyone having access to a car any time they need one? As you might suspect, this slightly loaded question is easy to answer for car sharing site Zipcar and ride sharing site GoLoco founder Robin Chase. In fast, Chase is a big fan of sharing in general. In a recent interview with Eric Steuer over at GOOD, Chase discusses that the sharing model is a benefit to society and not just the sharers themselves. "There's typically a huge amount of excess benefit that's going nowhere while we're absorbing all the costs," she said. "I like the idea of us thinking as a society about ways in which we can create platforms for other people to share in that excess capacity." While Zipcar often makes a financial case for its service, Chase explains that GoLoco users, too, can really benefit by opening up their cars to people who need rides. It's an interesting interview. Listen to it here.
[Source: GOOD]
Photo by Creativecommoners. Licensed under Creative Commons license 2.0.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
chuck 4:52PM (7/12/2009)
The biggest hurdle car sharing currently faces is the fact that cars have to be returned to where they were originally parked. Although your car may sit unused for 22 hours a day, it may sit in several different locations. For example, if you wanted to take your car to a movie theatre, with car sharing, you'd have to pay for all of the hours the car is sitting in the theatre's lot. If these companies developed a way to drop off your car at a different location, it would be much more practical for people financially. True, this would also require more vehicle locations in general, so people would be able to find another vehicle to take back home. If U-Haul and standard car rental companies can offer this, why can't companies like ZipCar do the same thing? The expense of shuttling cars around might cause the hourly rate to go up, but if you are using the car for less time, it would probably save money.
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Zeph 7:22PM (7/12/2009)
The problem with car sharing is logistics. If you're dependent on it and no car is available you get short changed on the service. Ownership has it's advantages, ie availability.
And at the end of the day a car is a personal thing which people want to have and make theirs. This is healthy, even if the current technology is not. What we need to focus is green energy. My suggestion is ethanol conversions in the short term, possibly followed be full electrics.
Car sharing will never work unless people lose their individuality and become social drones, and that's not the sort of world I would want to live in.
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DrDoogenstein 11:22AM (7/13/2009)
Don't they already have a chauffeured version of this?
I believe they are called taxis...
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