Saturday, April 17, 2010

In Austin Texas, Car2Go is going official

zipcar2-300x225Soon in Austin Texas, thanks to German company Car2Go, Texans could be seeing SmartCars in an entirely new light. The year old pilot program will be expanded within the car-sharing service to all city and state officials in Austin. Car2Go is a car-sharing service that charges users by the minute for use of SmartCars, a model that is becoming increasingly popular in large cities.

How Car2Go works

Car2Go is a system in car-sharing that places quite a few cars in one urban area. “Members” of Car2Go can then use their intelligent card to rent the cars by the minute. Anywhere within the Car2Go area, the Car2Go auto can be picked up or dropped off. At about 35 cents per minute of rental, the Car2Go system bridges the gap for urban residents that do not have a vehicle, but once in a while have need of one.

Car2Go or ZipCar

As an American business, founded in 2000, ZipCar is currently operating in 49 U.S. cities also as in Toronto, London, and Vancouver. After getting the Flexcar on board in 2007, ZipCar had about 50 percent of the auto sharing in their hands. ZipCar relies on "members" that use the membership card to unlock and rent ZipCars just like Cars2Go. ZipCar also has partnerships with numerous U.S. companies and universities that help students and commuters time-share their cars.

Auto Sharing Benefits

ZipCar and Car2Go represent just two of the large number of car-sharing services in the US and around the world. Many cities in the US, such as Buffalo, San Francisco, Boulder, NYC, Denver, Salt Lake City, and Minneapolis-Saint Paul have all started a vehicle sharing network. These car-sharing systems reduce congestion, increase flexibility, and tend to be much a lot more environmentally friendly. Also, large fleets of autos like ZipCar and Car2Go tend to use hybrid and electric cars, which will increase the overall fuel efficiency for hundreds of drivers in each city.



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