Car shares, compared

Here at Spacing Ottawa we’re big fans of  Vrtucar, the car-share organization that since 2000 has been helping Ottawans in need of occasional access to an automobile get to their appointments without the necessity of owning their own personal set of wheels.

Vrtucar is part of a Canada-wide association of car-share groups, and this past week we had the unique opportunity to see an example from Toronto organization and compare it side-by-side with a local vehicle. This endeavor may well cross almost certainly crosses the line into car-share geekery, so fair warning — female and other socially well-adjusted readers may want to look away now.

The car on the right of the picture above is the Toronto one, generously lent to Spacing publisher Matthew Blackett by Auto Share in support of the Spacing Roadshow series of events this July. With a typical car-share booking being for two hours or less (though long-distance rates are available) it’s fair to say that it is unusual to see a car-share vehicle from another city on the streets of Ottawa, much less being used as highway transportation for a cross-Canada tour — all the more reason we were keen to kick the tires and look for differences between cars from the two organizations.

The first thing we noticed was the make itself; whereas Vrtucar has long relied on Toyotas (first with Echos, then Yarises, now starting to shift to Corollas)  it is Mazda sedans like the one above that seem to be the mainstay of the Autoshare fleet, though they actually have 17 or 18 other makes and models on offer as well, depending on location. And Toronto has electric cars, too, including, their site says “Canada’s first plug-in Toyota Prius”

Fleet cars all need their vehicle identification numbers, and while Ottawa goes with a discreet white decal on the back of the rear-view mirror that didn’t show up through the windshield glare in the photos we took, the vehicle identification number is displayed prominently on Autoshare windshields with a red decal:

Toronto also does things a little differently with the entry key. Both organizations use a satellite transponder on the inside of the windshield to unlock the doors, but where Ottawa uses a keychain “e-fob” like this one:

Toronto uses a wallet card like this one:

Six of one and half-dozen of the other you might say, except that the Toronto wallet card is a kind of advertising too, a nice visual that helps users “show-off” about the organization to friends and acquaintances, while displaying important contact numbers as well.

Once you are inside the car, the ignition key is on a retractable wire cable in both Toronto and Ottawa cars; like this:

Finally, there is the log book. Every trip must be recorded so that the total time and mileage can be properly billed to the user.

That’s a pretty straightforward function as far as it goes, but it’s also a chance for the organization to remind you of your duties and responsibilities as a user. So while the basic logbook form is very similar between the two services, we spotted an extra “housekeeping” clause on top of the signature line on the Toronto form. Here’s what it says, in part:

“I confirm that all of the information I have entered is accurate, and the vehicle is safe and ready for the next member. The interior is at least as clean as I found it.”

Vrtucars are actually well-looked after, and most users are responsible members who pick up after themselves. As well,  the service  employs staff whose job it is to give the cars regular cleaning.

But to deal with those few bad apples who treat the cars like their own private wastebaskets, a lot of long-time Vrtucar users would likely agree that  Toronto-style  warnings — combined with strict  penalties for those caught breaking the covenant –would be a useful innovation for the Ottawa car-share to consider.

UPDATE: Some comments have asked for more information concerning how to book car-share vehicle, locations, and how much they cost.

Vrtucar uses an online booking system that is available to members behind a log-in paywall, so we can’t display that information, but basically you enter your preferred location and your time, and the available vehicles are displayed – you choose the one closest to you in the time you want, and you get an email confirmation saying the car is yours. Locations? Here’s what Vrtucar says about locations and size of their fleet:

VRTUCARs are located in the following Ottawa neighbourhoods:

Billings Bridge, Britannia Village, Byward Market, Carlingwood, Centretown, Glebe, Hintonburg, New Edinburgh, Old Ottawa East, Old Ottawa South, Sandy Hill, Vanier, Westboro and West Wellington. We maintain the same ratio of cars to members – every 18-20 new members means we add another car to the fleet.

You can get a sense of how AutoShare has a similar location-based booking system by viewing their locations map.

From experience, we can say that you are more likely to get the car you want if you book in advance, though for most spontaneous bookings during the day Monday through Friday we nearly always find a car available nearby. Evenings  from 6 -10  are a little more tight, though still fairly easy to get a car with a day’s notice, and weekends are the most intensively booked and often need advance booking – say 4 to 10 days in advance.

Pricing schemes are really flexible at Vrtucar, with the cheapest hourly rates going to full members who have paid the fully-refundable 500 dollar membership fee, and kilometerage varying between 17 to 46 cents per km, depending on your kind of membership.

Autoshare has its own tiered system of pricing – but the one thing the both systems have in common is that the prices are inclusive of gas, insurance, and maintenance.

This means that other than membership costs, which vary between “free” and up to 30 dollars per month, billing is based on two factors – hours booked, and distance fees by kilometer.