Carsharing in Germany: 2014 Perspectives

Germany is among the world leaders when it comes to the development of carsharing, as the following figures and graphics clearly illustrate. One of the primary reasons for this success has been the existence of strong networks and relationships between the cities and carshare operators over the last decade and more. And in this process the Bundesverband CarSharing e.V. (bcs) -- the industry association of the traditional car sharing organisations in Germany -- has played an important role. Let us have a look at their summary information on the situation in 2014, as well as in the preceding 17 years which have shown steady development and strong growth.

Carsharing boom continues in Germany

- Willi Loose, CEO, bcs

Berlin. Sharing not owning is a trend still persisting. So the annual balance of German carsharing, issued today by Bundesverband CarSharing e.V., shows that customer numbers went up considerably: meanwhile more than 750,000 users bank on the principle “using not owning” on German streets thus continuing the trend for carsharing observed in years. By now more than 1.1 per cent of the German population aged older than 17 participate in carsharing.

At the beginning of this year 757,000 customers had registered with one of Germany's 150 or so carsharing providers. Compared to the previous year this is an increase of 67.1 per cent. 320,000 customers had registered with providers offering station based carsharing (a plus of 50,000) while free-floating schemes counted 437,000 customers (a plus of 254,000). For the first time the quota of carsharing customers in relation to the overall population aged 18 or older exceeded the one per cent hurdle.

These customers have 7,700 cars at 3,900 pick-up stations and 6,250 cars from free-floating schemes at their disposal. With station-based carsharing an average of 42 customers share one car as do 70 customers of free-floating schemes.

Willi Loose, CEO of bcs, comments: “Dynamics of free-floating schemes are limited to a few German cities. They operate in 14 cities in all. Dissemination, however, is accomplished by station-based carsharing, which is operating in 380 cities and communities. Related to the people living in these cities and communities 33.35 million inhabitants are supplied with a station-based carsharing offer. Free-floating systems can be found in cities with altogether 9.31 million inhabitants.”

„Carsharing is a useful mobility service from an ecological point of view as well as from an economical one. Only by an intelligent combination of all modes of locomotion will we be able to provide mobility for everyone in the future. It will become part of many people’s routine to switch daily several times between walking, biking, using public transport, carsharing and a private car” says Martin zur Nedden, head of Deutsches Institut für Urbanistik (difu).

“From a municipalities point of view we appreciate the strong increase in registered carsharing customers very much. It is crucial for cities that through carsharing people give up their cars, bundle trips and reduce parking shortage as a result” says Hilmar von Lojewski of German Association of Cities. “According to past studies up to 11 cars can be replaced by one station-based carsharing car. Many cities have gathered a first positive experience with carsharing and rely on this service in addition to their own car pool for business trips.”

Karlsruhe maintained the title “Carsharing capital of Germany” in the city comparison conducted by bcs in September. With almost two carsharing cars (1.93) per 1,000 inhabitants the Baden metropolis beats other cities by a large distance. Dr. Frank Mentrup, senior mayor of Karlsruhe says during the press conference: “Carsharing relieves inner cities from private transport, reduces exhaust pollution and has a positive impact on the private budget of its customers. Stadtmobil, the provider operating in Karlsruhe, and all other carsharing providers make a contribution to the quality of life in our cities not to be underestimated.”

Note: For this survey bcs collected data from all known carsharing providers. Since some customers are registered with two or more providers double counts may occur. This applies especially for customers of free-floating schemes in big cities of more than 500,000 inhabitants if several free-floating providers are operating there. Since customer data of different providers are not squared, these double counts are inevitable.

 





* Bluebars: traditional carsharing. Dark blue: P2P



* Number vehicles (yellow bars), signed-up members (red squares)

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* bcs dynamic map showing member carshare locations - Source: http://www.carsharing.de/cs-standorte

 

* Thanks to Willi Loose & Gabi Lambrecht for sharing these valuable materials.

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About bcs:

Bundesverband CarSharing e.V. (bcs) is the industry association of the traditional car sharing organisations in Germany. BCS represents the political interests of the car sharing industry on a regional and national level, collaborates with other transport organisations and offers general information and publicity for car sharing. BCS also provides services to its members, like market research, and publishes yearly statistical data on the car sharing industry in Germany, which also include the car sharing organisations which are not member of BCS.

The BCS has, as of January 1st, 2012, 85 member organisations of very different sizes, ranging from the Stadtmobil group with about 1500 cars at 640 stations and 35,000 registered users to the Glonner Autoteiler with 1 car and 5 users.^[1] Most member organisations trace their roots back to the early 1990s, where private initiatives looking for 'ecological' and 'alternative' sustainable transport solutions formed the first car sharing organisations. Besides car-sharing organisations themselves, BCS includes organisations active around car sharing and befriended organisations in its membership.

The new car sharing companies formed by automobile makers car2go (Daimler AG), DriveNow (joint venture of BMW and Sixt) and Quicar (VW), who enter the car-sharing market by flooding a given city with hundreds of cars exclusively of their own brands, are not members of bcs. DB Rent, the subsidiary of rail and logistics giant Deutsche Bahn, which operates the Flinkster car sharing service, used to be a member of bcs, but left the association. With Flinkster, DB Rent cooperates with several of the traditional car-sharing companies by offering their cars as if they were Flinkster's own.

The seat of the association is Berlin. The governing board is composed (since May 2012) of Bernd Kremer, Christian Reining, Niklas Wachholtz, and Gisela Warmke.  BCS is member of the Verband Deutscher Verkehrsunternehmen (VDV), the industry association of public transit and transport in Germany and of the International Association of Public Transport (Union Internationale des Transports Publics, UITP), the world association of public transport organisations.

Source: L. Willms, Frankfurt and his  Wikipédia entry.

Contact: Bundesverband CarSharing e. V. (bcs), Willi Loose, CEO, Kurfürstendamm 52, 10707 Berlin, Phone: 0049 (0)30 - 92 12 33 54, E-Mail: info@carsharing.de, Internet: www.carsharing.de

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