Car clubs hit all the right notes, so why aren’t policy-makers beating the drum?

Chas Ball set up one of the UK’s first community-owned car clubs in Leeds and has been chief executive of Carplus since 2011. He will be stepping down early next summer as a first step to retirement.

Chas Ball set up one of the UK’s first community-owned car clubs in Leeds and has been chief executive of Carplus since 2011. He will be stepping down early next summer as a first step to retirement.

It was refreshing to hear the enthusiasm of Baroness Susan Kramer, the new transport minister whose remit covers car clubs, at the London launch of E-Car Club in Tower Hamlets last week. “Pay-as-you-go car clubs don’t just help us improve air quality, reduce traffic noise and cut carbon, they also give Londoners more choice about the journeys they take, reduce the cost of transport to individuals and businesses and promote more efficient use of cars,” she said.

A growing number of people now recognise the vital role car clubs can play in achieving carbon reduction and improved local air quality. However, in the absence of a strategic approach, there are few places in Britain where car clubs and bike-sharing are part of mainstream measures – and almost nowhere where they offer effective integration with public transport. 

Shared mobility – including car clubs and bike-sharing – are clearly a growth sector with new models emerging. Some operators are now beginning to diversify into electric vehicles and there are signs that new one-way models of car-sharing are creating a new market, although we do not yet have evidence of how far they contribute to environmental targets.

At Carplus Trust, the national organisation for shared mobility, we are pleased to report a growing network of car clubs in over 30 larger cities and towns. However, only in parts of London, Edinburgh and a few other medium-sized cities do we see high density of provision and recognition of the car club as part of urban mobility. This is testament to the political leadership of some local politicians and effective partnership working on the part of the main operators. So far, there has been a lack of strategic support from successive governments, as I will explore later.

In contrast, car clubs are growing in many cities in mainland Europe and North America where they complement public transport – facilitating modal shift and reducing car dependency. In Germany, VDV (the association of public transport operators), in a recent manifesto, encouraged members to extend the range of mobility services to include shared cars, bikes and taxis – so as to strengthen core services. This is already happening in cities such as Hannover.

The development of a portfolio of alternative modes – including the use of shared electric vehicles in the car club fleet – is not really on offer in Britain. Competition to the private car could be achieved but it needs to be well-presented, easy to use and pay for, and make good sense to drivers if it is to be a real option. 

Creating a closer relationship between shared mobility services and public transport is much more problematic when public transport is so fragmented – and not so “public”. Moves outside London to adopt smartcards for use by different operators and drive cash out of the system have yet to provide a significant platform for a cross-sector approach.

 Carplus has produced evidence of significant modal shift as a result of the growth of car clubs, showing how each car club car results in at least 12 cars removed from the community. In addition, recent analysis of car club vehicle emissions indicates that they are significantly cleaner and lower carbon than the cars people joining car clubs give up or opt to defer purchase. Typically, car club fleets are over 30% cleaner than the national average car and 15% lower than the car club fleet reported in 2011/12. Yet despite six years of consistent evidence, independently produced with full support of operators, we have yet to see any real strategic support from national government.  

Car clubs need to be recognised as part of public policy, providing pay-as-you-go, low and ultra low emission shared cars. In delivering sustainable transport, accredited operators already benefit from permit-based dedicated parking, providing residents and employers a low-cost, low hassle alternative to private car use. They are keen to achieve a higher profile as a service provider – like visible signage, public transport mapping and websites – as well as securing preferential status in the congestion charging area.

Strategic support from Transport for London and Transport Scotland has helped the network to continue growing and improve its visibility, but relatively little has been achieved in making car clubs part of the urban mobility strategies of other English cities apart from a few early adopters such as Bristol and Brighton & Hove. So what could make a difference over the next five years? 

If the health impacts of traffic emissions were properly recognised and given as much importance as carbon reduction, we would surely by now have made substantial progress with the introduction of Low Emission Zones (LEZs). By prioritising an effective national strategy to meet EU Air Quality standards we could start promoting shared mobility as just one of the measures to invest in to improve air quality.

Taken together with real incentives for establishing inter-modality as part of ‘end-to-end’ transport policy, more effective use of planning for low-car and car-free development, a strategy on air quality that introduces LEZs could make a significant difference to our approach to urban mobility. 

Not until we detach more people from car ownership and ensure car-sharing through car clubs is a mainstream option will we achieve wider use of the electric vehicles for local and regional trips. This means more car clubs, more shared electric vehicles and a greater role in providing pool cars for employers. 

Car clubs will feature in an LTT-sponsored conference on 13 November in London, ‘Urban mobility& alternatives to car ownership’.