try www.zipcar.com or www.carsharing.net

Zipcar is more expensive than renting a car! It is a good start, but not quite there yet. I can buy a new car for $300 a month or pay the same amount just to park a car in a garage. If that car was shared, the cost per day (neglecting insurance,gas,and maintenance) would be $10 a day, not $80 or $90. Maybe structuring the co-op as a non-profit would be better than a regular company?

Good idea! I'm sure the conservationists out there would be all over this one. Count me in too. I really wouldn't mind letting another responsible driver use my car while I'm at work. This surely needs to be worked out. Sure there will be some misses, but the success of this would ultimately rest upon us following the honor system, where we put the good of the group or co-op above our own good. Three strikes and you lose your privelege and are out of the group, or something like that. Worth trying out.

We notice that an average car is parked about 95% of its life and that this seems tremendously inefficent. Plus, wouldn't it be nice if you never had to worry about car insurance, maintenance and filling up with gas ever again? Yes, let's include a driver... more like a taxi cab... a new kind of taxi cab company.

In a dense urban environment like New Your City, you already have most people using subways or taxis to get around. Perhaps these cars would painted in giant yellow and red polka dots (OK just an example), so that when you went out in traffic, you could easily spot one. No doubt we will soon be able to hit a button on our cell phone and order at cab to our exact location, without talking to anyone (using GPS).

The key to making something like this work is not to set a price but to give the service away and let customers choose to pay what they want on a per mile basis. You give it away, so you get to choose who you give it to based on their reputation -- the relationship they build with your company. There is a limited supply of cars at any given time, so the customers that are willing to pay more (who value the service more) will maintain their privileges, otherwise they are subject to being bumped the next month by someone who has a higher average payment (who thinks the service is worth more) -- almost like bidding on Ebay.

Picture about 5 customers per car. You can have different scales for rush hour versus slow times, or perhaps a multiplier set in real time based on actual customer demand, minute by minute, accessible via the Internet or cell phone. This way the effective price can fluctuate so that the maximum number of cars are in use at any time where they can generate the most word-of-mouth publicity.

I can see it now, "hey Bob, look at this, the C-cars are down to a .53 multiplier right now. You have a good average payment per mile with C-Car, right? Let's grab that one over there. That's way cheap, huh? and a lot more comfortable than the subway. Also, they have place to plug in my cell phone in the back seat, and I need a charge anyway."

When the total revenue you collect is more than the cost of operating and maintaining the cars, you make money. Don't gouge the customers, though. If you don't add more cars (adding supply to bring the prices down), competing services will go into business to do it for you. This free market approach will keep the price at the optimum level and encourage service providers to come up with more efficent cars and more efficent computer systems to control where the cars are, so that cars are more likely to be available where you need them (by predicting demand and adjusting in real time).

Such services will also find other ways to make their service more valuable to their customers. Some services will be more luxurious, some will have a greater number of cars per customer, some will be super economic, and some will be super environmentally friendly. All can benefit from the improvements that the other services make in striving to better serve their customers, but they only choose to invest in the new technology when their customers demand them -- that is unless they patent their ideas and lock them up inside one company (you can read more on my website about why I think things will be much better when we choose not to use intellectual property laws like patenst and copyrights to "protect" our ideas from each other: betterdifferent.com/copyright

In the end, the result is a variety of services filling various customer needs and all trying to improve efficiency to reduce costs. Technology improves as each niche seeks to improve their value proposition to their customers. If there really is a one-size-fits-all approach and one company dominates the business, then the apparently monopoly is a good thing. The only true monopoly is one granted by government laws. When the free market is left to operate on its own without often-biased industry regulations, we get the best possible results. Companies that cater to their customers are rewarded. Win-Win-Win

Things just keep getting better.

-nate

We have a very successful car sharing co-op business here in Ottawa, Canada.

Check out Vrtucar - 23 vehicles; 21 Toyota Echos, 1 Matrix & 1 Astro Cargo Van.

/Eric.Snyder@Crudeawakening.net

I'm a member of one, claims to be the biggest car-share operation in the world, its called Mobility.
1000 locations, 1750 vehicles. The one you mention in Ottowa is tiny!

You are charged so much per hour plus so much per Km, and you get an itemised bill at the end of the month (just like a phone bill). Because you can have a car for a few hours only, it is a lot cheaper than renting, and a lot easier as you don't have to go to fill in forms, you just open the car and get in.

If you have friends, family or luggage to transport you just pick a bigger car.