My specific query is what happened to the Golf at Mass Ave in Boston--the car is now a Civic, without warning. This is now entering on at least the second week, and since I refuse to drive a Civic, it makes me have to go further afield for cars, or else simply not use Zipcar.

My more general query is two-fold: 1) The three closest cars to me are now all Civics. Why so many Civics in a row? Shouldn't Zipcar try to alternate so that, say, no more than two cars in a row are of any one type? 2) Can Zipcar open a new forum here, perhaps, and post messages when a given car is going to be moved for a week or longer, or when cars are cycled around for maintenance? It would be nice to know whether such a change is indefinite or not--I've been putting off a Saturday errand trip for two weeks now in the hopes that my Golf will return, but with a forum in which Zipcar states whether a change is temporary or not, I'd have the information to plan ahead.

-- Anonymous, February 02, 2004

Answers

Personally, I prefer the Civics. I'm assuming there's a few reasons Zipcar is going with more Civics: 1) more reliable--Hondas consistently are rated #1 or #2 in terms of reliability along with Toyota, 2) cheaper. Combine reasons 1 and 2 and you get a car that has a significantly lower cost of ownership than VWs.

As a Zipcar customer, I want them to maintain a fleet of highly reliable and environmentally friendly cars and they are doing that through building up their fleet of Hondas and incorporating hybrid cars such as the Prius.

If I cared enough about how I'll look because of the car I drive, I'd probably buy my own car at that point.

-- Anonymous, February 10, 2004

The issue has nothing to do, per se, with how I or another user would "look" in a car-- different drivers have different preferences, and my husband is not physically comfortable, or safe, driving in a Civic (he's so tall he can't see red lights out the sloped windshield, and his head ends up bent over uncomfortably--not so in a Golf, which is higher on the inside, with more headroom). However, again, user preferences are not the primary issue here.

There are really several issues here, and I'd appreciate some sort of response from Zipcar about these matters.

1) Can Zipcar work out a way--I suggested a forum here--to notify members of changes to the cars, and to suggest whether such a change is temporary short-term, temporary long-term, conditionally permanent, or permanent? It wouldn't be too onerous of Zipcar--it could be done easily with a form, just so that users would then have this sort of information. Another checkbox could specify whether the car was a) moved to a new location (if so, where, so if you had a favorite car you could follow it easily), b) undergoing repairs, or c) otherwise removed from the fleet.

2) Can Zipcar try to ensure more variety in the cars in a given area? Precisely because different users _do_ have different preferences, it would seem better to have the Civics and other cars scattered around, rather than having--as I do near me--the three closest cars all in a row be Civics. I realize this is impossible to coordinate precisely for all areas, but it does seem odd to cluster three of any one kind of car in such a small space.

-- Anonymous, February 11, 2004

Christina,

Thanks for this. We know where the cars are moving and why, and, in most cases for about how long. We are concerned about the appeal and utility of the cars to members and will always try to make sure that they have access to the cars they need. While I like the transparency of sharing the operations information we use to manage the fleet, I am not ready to put our fleet machinations on a public site. We do know that the issue becomes moot as we grow and add cars (and a variety of cars) to the neighborhoods and that continues to be our main focus.

Some of these moves have to do with managing maintenance and body work and might be for a day or a couple of weeks. Others are more permanent as cars are 'decommissioned'. Most moves have many 'dimensions' of need and impact and what we know today changes tomorrow.

Of course, we expect to notify users when a car comes out of service suddenly so they know they are getting in a different car.

I think it is coincidence that there are so many Civics near you and we will try to mix in different models there. We do have a lot of Civics, so we are always interested to know if someone hates them (and why).

-- Anonymous, February 12, 2004