[sustran] Plain-speaking on carsharing: strategies and support for Brussels next week

EcoPlan, Paris eric.britton at ecoplan.org
Sat Jan 22 00:01:23 JST 2005


Subject: Plain-speaking on carsharing: strategies and support for Brussels
next week

Background: See recent messages with above subject in World Carshare Forum
via http://worldcarshare.com .

 

Dear Sustran Friends,

 

I am sharing this with you as much because I believe this ardently non- or
anti-bureaucratic approach has a place in the move toward sustainability, as
in the belief that carsharing may indeed have a role in certain situation in
the Sustran region.

 

*        *        *

 

The last thing I want to do is to impose upon or in any way quiet this very
useful exchange, but let me pop in here a few other points which have come
up in some of our phone discussion in the last days that I think are
critical and which were not set out in the short note that I posted in order
to get this discussion into gear.  Once again, quick bullets for now:

 

1.	These grants are not in my view intended to finance so much new
start-ups as to help projects and groups who are already well into the
learning and deployment cycle to carry out some important, well defined next
steps.  Steve Cousins in a Skype conversation on this today refers to this
as “Second Round Carshare Support”.  Exactly. Let me give just one or two
ideas on this,  but those of you are working in this every day will have
many more. 

a.	An existing carshare operation has gotten along in its early phases
with a manual support system, but they are now scaling up and need to make a
best choice about how to do this, without just laying on their backs and
exposing their throats to the first supplier they find on the web.  I am
willing to bet that with a bit of help from our network, they could design a
terrific program to make the right choice and then adapt it for their
specific situation. What we might ask of them in turn, is to report both
their procedures, choices, criteria, and result on their or some other
website so that we can all profit from their experience.
b.	Or a pilot project for an existing CSO on the move, to build around
the city communications attractive signed carshare parking areas which
provide clear visible clues that carsharing exists in our city.
c.	Etc. etc. 

2.	Incidentally, it is quite possible that once a group has made good
use of a first grant, they might be an excellent candidate for another grant
once they have shown their mettle (and assuming of course that their
performance and their project justify such an allocation).
3.	Even for a new start-up – where of course they need to develop a lot
more than our famous two page initial summary as several of the group have
pointed out most clearly – the simple fact of applying for one of these
little grants, following the basic models that we can provide now after so
many years of experience, good and less good, and putting their project and
plans out for open discussions on the network, can already be a most useful
step.. even if there is no money for them in the earliest stages.  They will
be able to benefit from the wisdom and experience of the network, and even
if we have to say no to them… I would imagine that it would not need to be a
“no never”, but rather “No at this point, because here are some things to
which you need to give your attention.

a.	BTW, this is where it comes in handy to be able to pay, as planned,
our network associates when they chose to give this some time in an
individual critical evaluation.  Good will is great, but a little help from
a decent honorarium can encourage quite nicely (especially when it invokes
something that you are really interested in anyway). 

3.	And while I do not by any means see this as a research program, nor
as a support for more research on carsharing (thank you Dirk), there is
still plenty of room for good guidelines and procedural guides based on
solid experience.  I am confident that if the network were to be presented
with a couple of strong proposals in key areas, they would be inclined to
give them a sympathetic look.
4.	I am pleased that no one has yet come down to hard on what I think
of as the “no brainer” aspect of this approach, i.e., building the program
around grants of one size only rather than having to take it upon ourselves
or some “very smart” secretariat or bureaucratic function to figure out how
much here, how much there etc. 
5.	Brendan Finn brilliantly writes: “I suggest that you ask Brussels
for €5 million over three years, with the big commitment in year 1. Of this
€4 million is for the projects, €1 million is for setting them up,
evaluation and analysis, and dissemination. For the €4 million, you get
about 60 projects around Europe, done as sub-contracts.”   Precisely.
6.	By the way, and in closing, this brings up the point as to how can
cities and groups in the EU learn most and make the best contribution in
this area, not least bearing in mind that in barely four weeks Kyoto comes
into effect, and our cities here and world wide are no where near to even
starting on the agenda which is needed if we are to reverse direction from
the utter non-sustainability  which is our current path. Here are a couple
of ideas as grist for the mill on this:

a.	If I had to decide about this right now, I would set out the
following rough rules of thumb for the “EU/Kyoto Carshare Grant Program”.
Roughly a one-third divide from “Old Europe”, “New Europe” (Accession
countries including those who are standing in line) and the rest of the
world.  (I will be pleased to justify this at some point if the matter comes
up.)

7.	And finally, what would be our attitude if some city/groups steps
forward with a strong project that may not be exactly carsharing but which
could help make a real contribution for such an amount and before out
network in the area of more sustainable city mobility?  Well, all I can say
is that we would be real dumb if we did not at the very least give it a good
and sympathetic look.  Because we know that the path to sustainability is
one of pattern-breaks, surprises, originality, generosity and opportunism.
We thus cannot afford to blind ourselves at a good New Mobility Agenda idea
just because it may not exactly correspond with our intitial game plan.

 

Now back to you.

 

Eric Britton  

 

 

 

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