Date: January 02, 2007
Vertical Integration in Transportation
Here in the San Francisco Bay Area, we have three car sharing organizations, Zipcar (www.zipcar.com), Flexcar (www.flexcar.com) and City Car Share (www.citycarshare.org). Zipcar, by the way, has just started service in London. I haven't used any of these services because they don't have cars near where I live in the suburbs, but the idea makes wonderful sense. Instead of owning a car, just rent it by the hour. Most of the time my car sits in its parking spot. My wife and I calculated that the cost of owning, maintaining and operating her 1996 Honda Civic was about $15 per driving hour. Zipcar will rent you that same car – maybe even a better one -- for $8 an hour including fuel. There are parking spots all over the city where one can pick up a car from these services. When you're done with your errands, just drop it off where you got it. So if you were interested in introducing a new type of transportation into the marketplace, the first place I would start is with these types of organizations. Why? Simply because they control the customer experience from end to end. Not only that, since most of these cars are not used for more than small errands, it's possible to introduce technologies that aren't yet ready for long distance trips. For instance, if Zipcar were to purchase only electric vehicles, the cars could be plugged in between each use – completely eliminating the need to visit fueling stations. In fact, Toyota is pioneering this concept by providing Tufts University (Boston) with several Toyota RAV4 electric vehicles to use in their Zipcar implementation. What are these car sharing services actually integrating? Let's take a look.
What other form of integration is possible? Here are a few more:
These car sharing companies are taking the first steps in vertical integration. What other levels of vertical integration do you see possible? www.InspiringGreenLeadership.com
- They provide downtown parking as well as the use of the car. In a major city, this is a major benefit.
- They integrate the cost of refueling. Zipcar users fill up the gas at no extra cost whenever it gets below ¼ of a tank. They use a fueling card kept in the glove compartment.
- In the case of electric cars, they integrate the time of refueling. That job is done in between rentals -- especially overnight
- use the existing reservation system to allow Zipcar users to reserve prime parking spots in downtown parking garages -- perfect for midday stops
- partner with other transportation modes, like ferries, trains and buses, to eliminate the time and hassle of paying for each leg of a multi-mode journey
- permit private homeowners to rent their parking spot to allow neighbors access to a shared car
Rate this Post
9 Ratings
 |
Comments |
At 7:57 AM, January 02, 2007, Alexander Goerlach said...
Living in Berlin I really do not need a car totally on my own. Igo by bike or by public transport. However, sometimes there is an
appointment outside the city I would need a car for. The idea of
carsharing seems to be a solution for me as a
part-time-car-needer.
At 8:32 AM, January 02, 2007, santelmo said...
I was recently discussing the issue of town layout with a friend.So how could you manage to introduce an efficient public
transportation system in a city such as LA, where a lot depends
on point to point connections? Right now, this depend on
individual mobility systems, such as cars. Cities like Berlin,
NYC and London function more like a hub and spoke system, which
makes it easier to use centralized urban transportation there.
At 8:51 AM, January 02, 2007, sl77 said...
The whole car sharing concept is too inner city based right now.Within (at least european cities) I do not really need a car for
most things. But I still keep one because on the weekend it
would take me 1-2 hours to get to the countryside with puplic
transportation. Another important point with carsharing is, that
it seems difficult to use it with children. Most of the
car-sharing vehicles are rather small (makes sense to keep cost
low for most people) and lack any child-seat equipment wich makes
them unusable for me and my kids. The DB (German Railways)
rental-bike system works pretty good in some major cities here.
Although again no transportation for children ;-(
At 9:24 AM, January 02, 2007, santelmo said...
@ sl77, it might be city based, however most traffic worldwideis inner city and or commuter traffic. So using intelligent car
sharing / public transportation models would make a difference.
Most gas isnt used driving cross country - it´s used being stuck
in a jam,
At 12:53 PM, January 02, 2007, Andre Angelantoni said...
I agree that car sharing is very inner-city oriented right now. Iwould get rid of my car in a heart beat if they had cars where I
live in the suburbs. And sl77 makes a good point about
children and other needs. To resolve that problem, I think we
should look for ways to integrate even more. For instance, what
if the car were brought to the renter? To do that, hire people
to drive the car to the home and place a folding bike in their
truck (something like this but it could also be an electric bike)
so that they can get back and drop off the next car. There is
a service that does something similar for people who have been
drinking and don't want to drive themselves home called the
Scooter Patrol. As for child car seats, presumably one could
purchase them onesself and just move it from vehicle to vehicle.
RSS Subscribe
