Car-share limbers up: flexibility to popularise alternative mobility

Interest in shared mobility continues to grow along with the number of schemes and vehicles on offer. Frost & Sullivan predicts that the global car-share market will jump from 7 million members and 112,000 vehicles in 2015 to 36 million members and 427,000 vehicles by 2025.

The segment is attracting a growing number of players, and as competition increases so too do the options on offer. Zipcar claims to be the world’s largest pay-as-you-drive car club, boasting more than one million members and more than 12,000 vehicles across the UK, the US, Canada, Spain, France, Belgium, Turkey and Taiwan. It began offering its Flex service in the UK a year ago, in addition to its Roundtrip service. The former is a one-way, 'drive & drop' service that is targeted at spontaneous one-way trips. The borough of Westminster recently became the tenth London borough to sign up to the programme. Zipcar UK General Manager Jonathan Hampson believes this approach could help popularise car-sharing in general.