Round-trip car-sharing has been in existence for nearly two decades in the United States. Members commonly use car-sharing services to accomplish several errands via “trip chaining” in or out of town for a few hours at a time. Most car-sharing services in the U.S. are for-profit enterprises (e.g., Zipcar) and are typically located in major cities with high-quality transit options. However, there is an increasing number of publicly-funded electric car-sharing programs built around the needs of low to moderate income households. These services are typically housed in affordable housing complexes, located in smaller or rural cities, and subsidized. The white paper will identify current and former publicly-funded EV car-sharing programs (within the last few years) and conduct expert interviews and collect documentation on the programs in order to provide case studies on the lessons learned with respect to the investments, economies of scale, institutional arrangements, and sustainability of the programs.
