Carsharing

Shared ride services in North America: definitions, impacts, and the future of pooling

Susan Shaheen, Adam Cohen
2018

Shared ride services allow riders to share a ride to a common destination. They include ridesharing (carpooling and vanpooling); ridesplitting (a pooled version of ridesourcing/transportation network companies); taxi sharing; and microtransit. In recent years, growth of Internet-enabled wireless technologies, global satellite systems, and cloud computing - coupled with data sharing – are causing people to increase their use of mobile applications to share a ride. Some shared ride services, such as carpooling and vanpooling, can provide transportation, infrastructure, environmental, and...

Mobility on Demand Planning and Implementation: Current Practices, Innovations, and Emerging Mobility Futures

Susan Shaheen, Adam Cohen, Jacquelyn Broader, Richard Davis, Les Brown, Radha Neelekantan, Deepak Gopalakrishna
2020

This report provides Mobility on Demand (MOD) planning and implementation practices and tools to support communities. The report discusses different stakeholders in the MOD ecosystem and the role of partnerships in filling spatial, temporal, and other service gaps. Additionally, the report discusses how MOD can be integrated into transportation planning and modeling. The report also discusses shared mobility implementation considerations, such as rights-of-way management, multimodal integration, data sharing, equity, labor impacts, and the role of pilot evaluations. Finally, the...

Understanding Carsharing Risk and Insurance Claims in the United States

Susan Shaheen, PhD
Diwen Shen
Elliot Martin, PhD
2016

Screenshot of the title of the report and the authors

Carsharing offers consumers short-term access to vehicles, which facilitates better mobility and reduces the need for personal vehicle ownership. Carsharing does not require consumers to have automobile insurance. Instead, carsharing operators insure their members and are responsible for the risks and liabilities associated with vehicle use....

CarLink—A Smart Carsharing System

Susan Shaheen
1999

The author of this piece is today intensely involved in the second stage of her professional interest in carsharing. Starting several years ago, she began to look into as part of her doctoral research in transportation studies at an American university. Several years later, here she is as entrepreneur and manager behind an ambitious carsharing project. This is a report on the first months of their experience and goals for the future.

Car-sharing companies are taking a less germ-infested route in Covid-19 times

May 20, 2020
Bloomberg

getaround vehicle with logo

Car-sharing platforms, which have suffered during the Covid-19 lockdown, see an opportunity emerging: an increase in short-distance, local trips as U.S. consumers look for a different way of getting to work and running errands.

Executives from Turo, GetAround and ZipCar are hoping their pitch to customers—a means of travel that is cheaper than car ownership and sanitary—...

https://auto.hindustantimes.com/auto/news/car-sharing-companies-are-taking-a-les…

Car Sharing and Mobility Management: Facing New Challenges with Technology and Innovative Business Planning

Conrad Wagner and Susan Shaheen
1998

Based on the authors’ experience and knowledge of technical developments, several important factors for implementing carsharing in the future are recommended. The authors emphasize how carsharing organizations (CSOs) can be incorporated into multimodal mobility services by adopting new business strategies and advanced technologies. The authors identify exemplary CSOs that have already taken strides towards developing their organizations into intermodal mobility service providers.

Shared-Use Vehicle Systems: Framework for Classifying Carsharing, Station Cars, and Combined Approaches

Matt Barth and Susan Shaheen, PhD
2002

In recent years, shared-use vehicle systems have garnered a great deal of interest and activity internationally as an innovative mobility solution. In general, shared-use vehicle systems consist of a fleet of vehicles that are used by several different individuals throughout the day. Shared-use vehicles offer the convenience of a private automobile and more flexibility than public transportation alone. These systems are attractive since they offer the potential to lower a user’s transportation costs; reduce the need for parking spaces in a community; improve overall air quality; and...

Commuter-Based Carsharing: Market Niche Potential

Susan Shaheen, PhD
2001

The automobile accounts for more than 95 percent of all person miles traveled in the United States, whereas transit accounts for less than three percent of all trips. Between the private automobile and traditional transit, niche markets exist for other transportation services, such as airport and transit feeder shuttles and carsharing. Commuter-based carsharing, by which individuals share a fleet of vehicles linked to transit, could potentially fill and expand one such niche; complement existing services, mainly transit and feeder shuttles; and develop into a viable transportation...

Carsharing and Partnership Management: An International Perspective

Susan Shaheen, PhD, Daniel Sperling, and Conrad Wagner
1999

Most cars carry one person and are used for less than one hour per day. A more economically rational approach would be to use vehicles more intensively. Carsharing, in which a group of people pay a subscription plus a per-use fee, is one means of doing so. Carsharing may be organized through affinity groups, large employers, transit operators, neighborhood groups, or large carsharing businesses. Relative to car ownership, carsharing has the disadvantage of less convenient vehicle access, but the advantages of a large range of vehicles, fewer ownership responsibilities, and less cost...

California’s Zero-Emission Vehicle Mandate – Linking Clean-Fuel Cars, Carsharing, and Station Car Strategies

Susan Shaheen, PhD, John Wright, and Daniel Sperling
2002

To reduce transportation emissions and energy consumption, policy makers typically employ one of two approaches-changing technology or changing behavior. These strategies include demand management tools, such as ridesharing and vehicle control technologies that involve cleaner fuels and fuel economy. Despite the benefits of a combined policy approach, these strategies are normally employed separately. Nevertheless, they have been linked occasionally, for instance in the electric station car programs of the 1990s. Station cars are vehicles used by transit riders at the start or end of...