Owning and maintaining a car takes a lot of work and a lot of time. If you live in a rural area or miles outside of town, owning a vehicle is often a necessity, but what if you live in the city and you don’t need a car all the time? Car sharing is becoming a popular option for people in the city to get around when they need to without having to pay for a car they’re not using. But what exactly is car sharing, and will it become the norm?
What Exactly is Car Sharing?
Car sharing allows you to have a car when you need it without paying for it when you’re not using it. It works a little like renting, but you don’t have to worry about picking up and dropping off at a rental agency with office hours. Some of the car-sharing businesses you might have seen around include ZipCar and Enterprise Carshare.
Members have access to a network of shared vehicles that are typically located throughout a city, community, or even a college campus. The locations are unattended, so members are on their own to pick up and drop off the vehicle.
How Does Membership Work?
In most cases, members need to sign up, pay a fee, and go through a pre-qualification process. A valid driver’s license is required along with a clean driving record. Once you become a member of one of the car-sharing organizations, you use the app or website to reserve a car.
Flexibility Is the Future of Driving
One of the reasons that car sharing over car ownership and car renting is flexibility. If you only need a car for a few minutes to make a quick run to the store or you need a car for a weekend trip outside of the city, car sharing makes it easy to only pay for what you need. Most car-sharing services offer billing per minute, so you can make a quick trip or reserve it for an entire week. It’s all up to you.
The flexibility is not just in the billing. The free-floating system means that there are vehicles spread out around a certain area. You can pick up the car in a spot that’s close to you and then park it in the closest parking space designated for the car-sharing service.
What About the Keys?
Physical keys may also be a thing of the past. Now, as long as you have the carsharing app, you can use your phone as your key. But, since not all vehicles have a phone-as-key technology, there are some other ways to locate it.
In push-to-start vehicles, the keys are usually hidden in the vehicle. Since they stay will the vehicle at all times, you don’t need to have them in your hand. For cars with traditional keys, they will often be tethered to the steering wheel, in the glove compartment, or one of the side door compartments.
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