Zip cars leaving vehicles in our road

[PandG]

Has anyone experienced Zip cars leaving cars locally in their road as ours has limited parking - I thought they had to be left in allocated bays but for over a week we had a Zip car parked and left without moving then yesterday it was taken away and another one was left in its place. I had phoned and then emailed them and the change in vehicles seemed to happen after that. But no response so far to my second complaint.

Does anyone know what there policy is for parking on residential streets?

P

[bubbachumps]

Surely a Zip Car has the same right to be parked as any other so as long as there are no parking restrictions on your road any car driver can park there.

[V511]

I'm a zipcar user and as far as I know, it still is and always has been the case that we have to leave the cars in the designated parking bay.

Perhaps the person has hired the car for a long period and is just parking there as though it were their own car? And then they hired a different vehicle?

[titch juicy]

PandG Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Has anyone experienced Zip cars leaving cars

> locally in their road as ours has limited parking

> - I thought they had to be left in allocated bays

> but for over a week we had a Zip car parked and

> left without moving then yesterday it was taken

> away and another one was left in its place. I had

> phoned and then emailed them and the change in

> vehicles seemed to happen after that. But no

> response so far to my second complaint.

>

> Does anyone know what there policy is for parking

> on residential streets?

>

> P

Could it be that someone has hired it for a period of time and is parking in their street?

[gm99]

One is currently parked outside our house - as of a few days ago. It was parked by two people who seemed to be working for Zipcar, who photographed the car then left on foot. My guess is they are changing their operating model to an app based approach that shows where the cars are parked, without the need for dedicated bays - at least where there is no CPZ in operation (I'd guess saving Zipcar money).

[Abe_froeman]

Might it be worth reporting it as abandoned if its a nusiance and not in a bay?

[ianr]

If gm99 is correct about a variation in operating model, the cars that are not in dedicated bays would presumably show up on maps like this one: http://www.zipcar.co.uk/car-hire-london? If they do, you might want to ask Southwark whether their use of non-dedicated parts of the road is in breach of their contract with the council.

[Bic Basher]

Zipcar are leaving cars on the Lordship Lane Estate as well. One of my neighbours couldn't use her parking space for the whole week as one was left there. (All cars need a permit to park)

They've now parked another car on the estate which I understand from my mother who spoke to the Estate manager is being removed by Southwark tomorrow.

[ruffers]

DriveNow which operates more in North London has a park anywhere including council bays policy, ie not fixed.

[PandG]

Maybe James Barber can tell us what Southwarks policy is regarding Zip cars ?

[Beulah]

There's one in my road too that's NOT in a marked bay (close to Bellenden Road). Been there for a week. Doesn't appear to have been used in that time and doesn't appear on the Zipcar app.

I have used Zipcar in the past and know they were trying to get Southwark Council to approve a system where people can hire cars in one area and leave them in Southwark.

I got the impression Southwark weren't too keen on it.

I wonder if that's anything to do with the sudden appearance of Zipcars on random streets...

[PandG]

Well finally a reply from Zip car and it seems that's it then!? Watch out in your Road if you have limited parking too!

'Thank you for getting in touch in regards to the parking space of our GLI7 ZDO Zipcar.

Having looked at our system, I can see that this vehicle belongs to the Zipcar Flex Service, which has recently been launched across South London. Zipcar Flex allows members to book one-way trips and drop off their Zipcars in any approved space within the Zipzone.

Zipcar Flex vehicles can be parked almost anywhere within the Zipzone providing no parking restrictions apply. These include:

Car Club Only bays (Zipcar Roundtrip vehicles live there)

Pay & Display Only bays

Disabled bays ? Business Permit Only bays

Suspended bays

Yellow lines, red routes, junction boxes, zig-zag lines, pedestrian crossings & all other nationally restricted areas

Housing estates and private roads

Roads on the TFL Road Network

Parking bays in part time bus lanes

Selected streets or areas closed by the borough council.

If you have any further questions or concerns, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

Regards,

Ioanna

Zipcar Member Services

zipcar

[James Barber]

Hi PandG,

Southwark charges Zipcars a great deal of money for each formal and reserved parking space for Zipcar. Effectively a tax on people car sharing.

It would make lots of sense for car sharing organisations to find a way of circumventing this. Southwark are also going to market again for their car sharing relationship. This would add extra pressure to insure against the loss of this relationship by Zipcar.

If they're still reducing the demand for people to permanently own their owns cars then overall it saves significant parking space. Which doesn't make it any less annoying if you're used to parking outside your own house.

But Zipcar wont deploy more cars than they can cover their operating and capital costs. So we shouldn't expect otbe over run with such cars. And research suggests up to 25 private cars over time are replaced by each shared car such as a Zipcar.

If anyone finds an excess of these let me know ASAP.

[tomskip]

I can't see why it's a problem. The very existence of Zip Cars means there's fewer cars on the road.

[Beulah]

And as if by magic Zipcar has just started promoting Zipcar Flex:

http://www.zipcar.co.uk/flex?utm_source=zc_eu&utm_medium=email&utm_term=email&utm_content=wkmlr&utm_campaign=PIDMID149159

I suppose it'll become a problem (to car owners at least) if the Zipcars prevent residents parking in their street. One Zipcar per street may not make much difference but if it was to turn into 2 or 3...

I think car sharing is a good idea for Inner London and I have used Zipcar but it's not that cheap.

If you want to use a car at weekends and maybe occasionally during the week or for holidays, it's not that much more to own a car.

Make Zipcars/car sharing much cheaper though and it would become a no-brainer.

[alex_b]

Obviously Zipcar are biased but they claim (http://www.standard.co.uk/news/transport/car-ownership-costs-london-drivers-more-than-3000-a-year-a3172511.html) a annual cost of ?3,436 which is a bit higher than other figures I've seen that place it nearer ?2,500. They also claim on average people in London use their car for 30 mins per day, I've seen similar global statistics that put average utilization for private cars at a little under an hour a day.

Even at ?2500 a year, this would buy a little over an hour a day of round trip driving with zipcar or 23 minutes a day of one way driving. I think that once we're past the car seat phase we'll ditch our car and switch to car sharing (and hire cars for weekends away).

[mimifantasia87]

there is one or two parked on hindmans road blocking my drive almost! grrr

[Abe_froeman]

The problem I see with it is that they aren't paying for any of the upkeep of the streets while taking full advantage of the council tax payers who are.

The public are providing them with free business premises. Why should I pay for Zipcar to run their business for free from outside my house?

[Abe_froeman]

It is also interesting that the Lib Dems are opposed to charging Avis (the owner of Zip car and an overseas company) tax.

So they are happy for the residents to pay for double yellow lines, speed bumps, and build outs in roads causing a loos of parking but they don;t want to charge Avis any tax.

And by accepting this state of affairs it obviously completely undermines the car club scheme using southwark bays that seems to be out to tender meaning more loss of revenue for the council that will have to be paid for by the taxpayer instead of the corporations using our streets for their business.

[beigemartin]

Car2go tried and failed at the one-way minute charging hire model Zipcar are now trying, I think at least partly due to uncooperative parking restrictions.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Car2Go

I've been with family using it in another city and thought it was great - it overcomes many of the logistical / planning issues of using Zipcar.

They're only just launching so I suspect they have had to position the fleet without many active users, hence some cars parked and left unused. Hopefully they will succeed and provide an alternative to car ownership.

[beigemartin]

"they aren't paying"

What makes you think they don't have a commercial arrangement to pay the local authority for the use?

[Abe_froeman]

The local authority have confirmed it on this thread Martin...

"Posted by James Barber Today, 11:25AM

Hi PandG,

Southwark charges Zipcars a great deal of money for each formal and reserved parking space for Zipcar. Effectively a tax on people car sharing.

It would make lots of sense for car sharing organisations to find a way of circumventing this. Southwark are also going to market again for their car sharing relationship. This would add extra pressure to insure against the loss of this relationship by Zipcar. "

How they expect to negotiate a new deal with someone else while allowing zipcar to park for free anywhere they like is beyond me.

[beigemartin]

I don't see in that message where is says they don't charge for parking outside the 'formal and reserved parking space'. Implied by omission?

[Abe_froeman]

I think it must be, if they are "circumventing" paying charges and are losing their relationship with Southwark.

[BrandNewGuy]

Abe_froeman Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> How they expect to negotiate a new deal with

> someone else while allowing zipcar to park for

> free anywhere they like is beyond me.

They're not 'allowing' Zipcar to park for free. Without designated bays, Zipcars can park wherever they like in streets without restrictions. I'm all for car clubs and fully intend to get rid of my car at some point soon, but there are three hurdles to overcome: getting a critical mass of local users which will, in fact, free up spaces for car club cars; trying to ensure that the car club 'market' is sufficiently competitive to keep prices down; and stopping the bloomin' council from using car clubs as yet another revenue generator, even though they seem to actually want fewer cars in the borough.