Also, I feel like I've seen fewer ZipCars in general over the past 24 months and fewer designated parking spots for them around town. Have Turo, rideshares and scooter rentals squeezed their market?
And I should say, how have they not started to transition to going all EV.
A rental car left with no gas by the previous renter is much easier remedied than an EV left empty by a previous renter.
In reply to John Welsh :
Zipcars have designated parking spots though throughout a city. You make it so there are charging stations at each designated spot. Then on the app you can also have it noted when vehicles are out on rental and that charging stations are available to be booked for 15 to 30 minute windows.
John Welsh said:A rental car left with no gas by the previous renter is much easier remedied than an EV left empty by a previous renter.
That's easy. The clock stops on the rental when the car is plugged into a charger.
captdownshift (Forum Supporter) said:Zipcars have designated parking spots though throughout a city. You make it so there are charging stations at each designated spot. Then on the app you can also have it noted when vehicles are out on rental and that charging stations are available to be booked for 15 to 30 minute windows.
Most likely the answer is "money" because that's a lot of EV charging stations to buy and maintain, plus you need staff to handle the logistics of shuffling cars around on the chargers.
Do you need staff? Because if these things have dedicated parking spots, then you just have to find a parking spot. And if you have a parking spot, you have a charger. Unless these things are like rental scooters and you just abandon them in the middle of the road when you're done with them.
But there's definitely some infrastructure investment to get to that point.
I'm guessing the usual zipcar is a cheapie. Which is cheaper, cheap gasoline-powered, or cheap EV?
1988RedT2 said:I'm guessing the usual zipcar is a cheapie. Which is cheaper, cheap gasoline-powered, or cheap EV?
TCO or purchase price? Who's paying for fuel?
This would be a perfect use for Bolts, for example. They're not that expensive to buy and they cost peanuts to run compared to a gasoline powered car.
In reply to codrus (Forum Supporter) :
They generally have staff/contractors, people are sent out to clean or detail cars, refueling is often done by contractors, staff moves cars to where they are needed - there is a lot of background that many people don't see.
Keith Tanner said:Do you need staff? Because if these things have dedicated parking spots, then you just have to find a parking spot. And if you have a parking spot, you have a charger. Unless these things are like rental scooters and you just abandon them in the middle of the road when you're done with them.
But there's definitely some infrastructure investment to get to that point.
I've never used one, but I'm under the impression that you don't have to drop it off in the same place you picked it up. I don't know if you just abandon them or if they have a number of designated places in which to park them. Either way though, it seems likely that they'd want to share chargers across the fleet rather than installing a unique one for every car they operate, and that means that "I came by to drop it off but there were no charging spots open" is a problem you have to solve.
Zip cars have designated drop off parking spots. In Baltimore they have a contract with a car wash company where if you take it through the full service car wash (at no charge to you) within 2 hours of drop off time, then you get a discount towards your next rental.
The lime scooters have "juicers" who come pick them up by the truck load and take them to charging locations to then drop back off throughout the city at high volume spots.
codrus (Forum Supporter) said:Keith Tanner said:Do you need staff? Because if these things have dedicated parking spots, then you just have to find a parking spot. And if you have a parking spot, you have a charger. Unless these things are like rental scooters and you just abandon them in the middle of the road when you're done with them.
But there's definitely some infrastructure investment to get to that point.
I've never used one, but I'm under the impression that you don't have to drop it off in the same place you picked it up. I don't know if you just abandon them or if they have a number of designated places in which to park them. Either way though, it seems likely that they'd want to share chargers across the fleet rather than installing a unique one for every car they operate, and that means that "I came by to drop it off but there were no charging spots open" is a problem you have to solve.
Right, but if they already have to be returned to an Official ZipCar Parking Spot that's functionally no different than returning to a charger.
Car Share (Rental Agencies) that I've seen pay a land owner or city for marked spaces and that frees them from parking restrictions elsewhere they are subject to length of time and hour of day restrictions. The rental can be terminated within an acceptable area - I know of being able to terminate in The City of North Vancouver but not the larger surrounding District of North Vancouver.
I use Zipcars at work from time to time. At least where I live, you have to return the car from where you got it. A majority of cars that are available downtown are in office building parking garages -- Zipcar rents the space, and having the cars benefits the office's tenants. It doesn't seem feasible to me that Zipcar would ask an office building to install charging stuff.
But it's kind of moot: the cars need to be available immediately after a rental period ends. I might pick one up just minutes after it's been returned by someone else. (Btw, there can be large penalties for returning the car late.) You can't quickly re-rent a car that's been returned with no juice left in the battery.
They'd have to use cars with enough battery to get through a typical day. The Bolt I mentioned, for example, can run errands around town all day long so it won't necessarily be returned drained. Heck, they get used for taxis around here.
Zipcar has the data to know what usage looks like. They could determine what the necessary range and recharge speed would have to be in order to give 99% availability.
Sounds like you're speaking of Indycar; they had a fleet of EVs and special parking lots for rideshare until they went under in 2019. I looked into finding one and buying it at low price, but the state government was still trying to figure out what they wanted to do with them last I saw. Sucks too, they have a wierd-ass battery pack.
procainestart said:I use Zipcars at work from time to time. At least where I live, you have to return the car from where you got it. A majority of cars that are available downtown are in office building parking garages -- Zipcar rents the space, and having the cars benefits the office's tenants. It doesn't seem feasible to me that Zipcar would ask an office building to install charging stuff.
But it's kind of moot: the cars need to be available immediately after a rental period ends. I might pick one up just minutes after it's been returned by someone else. (Btw, there can be large penalties for returning the car late.) You can't quickly re-rent a car that's been returned with no juice left in the battery.
My work has been doing some extensive remodeling for 1.5 years and we've had dozens of contractors through here - each renting their own scissors lift. About 25-30% of the time they've been burned by low/dead batteries and wasted hours/days waiting to get a charged lift swapped out by the rental agency. So I agree with your observations.
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