A ninety-year-old woman with Alzheimer's and a heartbroken young man end up sharing a ride to Brussels that changes their lives forever. When Alex pulls up to meet 'Max', he expects everything but a ninety-year-old lady who has her heart set on getting to Brussels by carpool. As for 'Max', who is actually called Maxine, she could not be more ill at ease when settling into the seat next to this young man with bloodshot eyes. God help her if he turned out to be a drug addict who hasn't slept in days! When it becomes clear that Maxine is suffering from Alzheimer's and wants to take matters in her own hands while she still can, and that Alex battles severe depression, a wonderful friendship starts to form between the unlikely pair. Before long, their travel plans take an unexpected turn...
Jens Kopp analyzes the potential of car sharing as a new mobility solution in light of progressive urbanization and researches factors influencing the use of car sharing to assess the growth outlook of car sharing services. He performs a regression analysis to identify statistically significant factors influencing the use and evaluation of car sharing services based on an empirical field research conducted in Germany (n=175). Key findings include that cost saving is the only researched factor relevant to influence the use of car sharing services as well as the evaluation of car sharing and the assessment of its future. The existing research shows that car sharing is a viable lever to address substantial ecological and economic mobility issues and the conducted research provides new insights into the factors influencing the use and evaluation of car sharing services.
Please note that the content of this book primarily consists of articles available from Wikipedia or other free sources online. Pages: 24. Chapters: Zipcar, Peer-to-peer car rental, Streetcar, Flexcar, Mobility CarSharing, City Car Club, Momo car-sharing, Whizzgo, PhillyCarShare, Cambio CarSharing, I-GO, Witkar, RelayRides, Communauto, Car2Go, U Car Share, StattAuto, GoGet, Buffalo CarShare, AutoShare, GoCar, Greenwheels, PeoplesCar. Excerpt: Zipcar is a membership-based car sharing company providing automobile reservations to its members, billable by the hour or day. Zipcar was founded in 2000 by Cambridge, Massachusetts residents Antje Danielson and Robin Chase, and is now led by Scott Griffith, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. As of December 2010, the company offers a fleet of over 8,000 vehicles in urban areas throughout 28 North American states and provinces, as well as in the United Kingdom, and has over 560,000 members which the company refers to as "Zipsters." Zipcar offers more than 30 makes and models of self-service vehicles by the hour or day. Zipcar has major operations in Atlanta, Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, London, New York, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle, Toronto, Washington D.C. and Vancouver. The company also has presence on over 230 college campuses. Members can reserve Zipcars online or by phone, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Reservations can be made minutes up to a year in advance. Zipcar members have automated access to Zipcars using an access card called a "Zipcard," which works with the car's technology to unlock the door, where the keys are already located inside. Zipcar also offers an iPhone application, recognized by Time magazine as one of the "Best Travel Gadgets of 2009," that allows members to honk the horn to locate a Zipcar and unlock the doors. Zipcar charges a one-time application fee of $25, and an annual fee of $60, depending on the market, and reservation rates start from $7.50 per...
This book examines electric car sharing in cities from a variety of perspectives, from service design to simulation, from mathematical modeling to technology deployment, and from energy use improvement to the integration of different kinds of vehicle. The contents reflect the outcomes of the Green Move project, undertaken by Politecnico di Milano with the aim of fostering an innovative and easily accessible electric vehicle sharing system. The first section of the book illustrates the car sharing service, covering service design, the configuration of the vehicle sharing model and the Milan mobility pattern, analysis of local demand and supply, testing of the condominium-based car sharing model, and communication design for social engagement. The second section then explains the technological choices, from the architecture of the system and dynamic applications to information management, the smartphone-based energy-oriented driving assistance system, automatic fleet balancing systems, and real-time monitoring of vehicle positions. In the final section, readers will find descriptions of the simulation model, a model to estimate potential users of the service, and a model for a full-scale electric car sharing service in Milan.
The various sharing initiatives seen in the Nordic countries over the last years within transportation, housing/accommodation, sharing/renting of smaller capital goods and personal services could yield considerable benefits for consumers due to better quality and/or lower prices of the services. They also have a potential for emissions reductions of CO2 and local pollutants. However, savings from lower prices could lead to increased emissions from increased demand of the services (particularly transport) and increased spending on other goods and services. Depending on how consumers spend their savings, these changes could partly, wholly or more than offset the initial emission reductions. The impacts on overall CO2 emissions depend on whether the emissions are taxed, part of the emissions trading system EU ETS or not regulated at all.
Viewing transportation through the lens of current social, economic, and policy aspects, this four-volume reference work explores the topic of transportation across multiple disciplines within the social sciences and related areas, including geography, public policy, business, and economics. The book’s articles, all written by experts in the field, seek to answer such questions as: What has been the legacy, not just economically but politically and socially as well, of President Eisenhower’s modern interstate highway system in America? With that system and the infrastructure that supports it now in a state of decline and decay, what’s the best path for the future at a time of enormous fiscal constraints? Should California politicians plunge ahead with plans for a high-speed rail that every expert says—despite the allure—will go largely unused and will never pay back the massive investment while at this very moment potholes go unfilled all across the state? What path is best for emerging countries to keep pace with dramatic economic growth for their part? What are the social and financial costs of gridlock in our cities? Features: Approximately 675 signed articles authored by prominent scholars are arranged in A-to-Z fashion and conclude with Further Readings and cross references. A Chronology helps readers put individual events into historical context; a Reader’s Guide organizes entries by broad topical or thematic areas; a detailed index helps users quickly locate entries of most immediate interest; and a Resource Guide provides a list of journals, books, and associations and their websites. While articles were written to avoid jargon as much as possible, a Glossary provides quick definitions of technical terms. To ensure full, well-rounded coverage of the field, the General Editor with expertise in urban planning, public policy, and the environment worked alongside a Consulting Editor with a background in Civil Engineering. The index, Reader’s Guide, and cross references combine for thorough search-and-browse capabilities in the electronic edition. Available in both print and electronic formats, Encyclopedia of Transportation is an ideal reference for libraries and those who want to explore the issues that surround transportation in the United States and around the world.
Access and accessibility are central themes in architecture and urbanism. The goal is to make buildings accessible both horizontally and vertically, as well as to provide them with technical infrastructure. But the aim is also to ensure the accessibility of whole streets, routes, parks, and squares, and even entire cities and regions. Today, access is a key concept in the most disparate areas of life. Thus, it is also a matter of access to knowledge and education, access to knowledge media like the Internet, access to healthcare, access to languages, etc. In thirteen articles, this book deals with this world of access in architecture, city planning, and neighboring fields. Topics include ensuring the accessibility of entire urban areas, renewing that of areas that were previously utilized differently, including the general populace in concept planning, and how architecture can help provide access to a better quality of life.
Annotation The three volume set LNAI 4692, LNAI 4693, and LNAI 4694, constitute the refereed proceedings of the 11th International Conference on Knowledge-Based Intelligent Information and Engineering Systems, KES 2007, held in Vietri sul Mare, Italy, September 12-14, 2007. The 409 revised papers presented were carefully reviewed and selected from about 1203 submissions. The papers present a wealth of original research results from the field of intelligent information processing in the broadest sense; topics covered in the first volume are artificial neural networks and connectionists systems, fuzzy and neuro-fuzzy systems, evolutionary computation, machine learning and classical AI, agent systems, knowledge based and expert systems, hybrid intelligent systems, miscellaneous intelligent algorithms, intelligent vision and image processing, knowledge management and ontologies, Web intelligence, multimedia, e-learning and teaching, intelligent signal processing, control and robotics, other intelligent systems applications, papers of the experience management and engineering workshop, industrial applications of intelligent systems, as well as information engineering and applications in ubiquotous computing environments.
