Car Sharing Network CarSharing
















January 2012

Carsharing is designed to replace car ownership for people who do not need to drive to work every day, and to significantly reduce congestion and greenhouse gas emissions. Carsharing is a service that provides 24/7 self-serve access to a network of vehicles stationed around your city (and increasingly, cities world-wide), which can be reserved by the hour or day via smart phones, Internet and call centres.

This amazing green business idea works because people save money, and lose the hassles of ownership, yet still have the beneficts of access to a car when they need one.

Car Sharing pilot projects like Witkar began as early as the 1960's and 1970's, but modern car sharing programs launched in 1987 in Switzerland and later in 1988 in Germany, and came to North America via Quebec City in 1994. [The first successful car share in the USA, Portland Oregon's CarSharing-PDX

As of July 1, 2011- based on data provided by Susan Shaheen, University of California, Berkeley - 26 U.S. carsharing programs claimed 560,572 members sharing 10,019 vehicles; and 78,840 members shared 2,605 vehicles among 20 carsharing organizations in Canada.

Carsharing membership has grown tremendously over the past 15 years - since it launched in North America in Quebec City in 1994 - and the industry has recently attracted significant commercial attention. Take a look at a decade of carsharing growth:

'If you live in a city, you don't need to own a car.'

William Clay Ford Jr.,
Chair, Ford Motor Company Ltd.
November 2000