Notes from a ZipCar User
on
Time Sharing Cars
·
· Score: 4, Informative
I live in Cambridge, MA, and I used ZipCar for about three years. When I came to Boston from Kentucky, the first thing I noticed was that driving here really sucks. Besides that, I worked in the Back Bay neighborhood, and parking near work was $400 a month. Luckily, Boston has an excellent public transportation system, so for about $60 a month, I got a subway/bus pass. At that point, I realized that I was only driving two Saturdays a month. So, these two Saturdays were costing me $450 a month ($350 car payment & $100 a month insurance). It was officially cheaper to rent a car for those two days. So I got rid of my car.
This was two years before ZipCar came into existance. Renting a car from a traditional rental agency involves going to the agency during their working hours, standing in line (frequently 1/2 hour), filling out paperwork, and returning the car during working hours. It makes no sense to rent the car for less than a day. Thus when ZipCar started up, and the booking time became 5 minutes at home and you could book for a couple hours, it was huge.
It was only when I moved to the far west side of Cambridge, where it's easier to find a parking space near the house and there aren't 7 ZipCars within walking distance (in fact there isn't even 1) that I decided it was time to get a new car.
From a geek standpoint, the system is extremely cool. The company issues you a card key associated with your account. You reserve the car on-line. A cell based system in the car is alerted to let the car know when you've rented it. During your rental time your card key unlocks the doors and the ignition. You can continue to drive if you go past the quiting time, but they charge you $25 for being late. In Boston, you're always late because of traffic, so it's cheaper just to rent the car for 1/2 hour or hour more than you think you'll need it.
So in answer to some of the questions I've seen:
(1) Why don't you just take public transportation? I did 95% of the time.
(2) Is it reliable? Yes. The $25 late fee seems to insure that the car is back on time. I never had to wait for the car to be returned.
(3) Is it dirty? No. There is a $50 charge for trashing the car.
(4) Is it wrecked? For whatever reason, the cars had very few dings. If the car is in a serious accident, it is taken out of commission. The company contacts the current renters and rebooks them to different cars.
(5) Who does the maintenance / washes the cars? The company does. If you want to wash the car yourself, the company reimburses you.
(6) Does it make sense in every town? No, only in very dense cities that have good public transportation.
(7) Isn't it expensive? Not compared to the price of owning a car in a big city.
(8) Is it convenient? Yes. In Boston / Cambridge there are a ton of cars. Until I moved far enough away from the central part of the city, it was pretty easy to find a car near my home or work free at any given time (except holiday weekends).
(9) Will it impress a woman? No, but she lives in the city, too. Meet her at a coffee shop and then take her to a nice restaurant.
When Professor Gies talks of "the community of trust," he is specifically speaking about the University of Virginia Honor Code. This is a formalized institution at UVa, consisting of the following components.
1) In order to be accepted to the University, a student must read and sign the Honor Code rules and regulations (mainly don't cheat, don't help others cheat, turn in cheaters, understand that everyone will be doing this, too). I think in 1986 when I applied to UVa (I didn't go there), one of the essays on the application required me to tell the University what I thought about the Honor Code.
(2)Whenever anyone takes an exam or turns in a project at UVa, they are required to append and sign a statement that says something to the extent of "On my honor, I have neither given nor received aid on this work."
3) Anyone caught cheating is tried before a council of students, not professors, and can be expelled from the university.
As you can see, the University has tried to create a community where honesty and personal integrity are created and maintained by the student body, not imposed by the University Administration. I'm certain that this is the "community of trust" that was referred to.
BTW, this accusation of wide spread cheating is a huge black eye to the University. They pride themselves in the Honor Code as something that sets them apart from other schools. If it turns out that their students are ignoring it, part of their self-perceived elite reputation is seriously tarnished.
I was curious if kids are really more likely to commit murder now than in the past, so I did a little research. The results are pretty interesting.
From 1986 to 1993 there was a huge spike in murders of and by people aged 14 to 24. From 1993 to 1999, however, the number of teenage related murderers has steadilly dropped to the same level as it was in 1976. I have no numbers for 2000 or projections for 2001, but it certainly seems that the problem is not nearly as bad as it used to be.
Don't believe me? Check out the report by the U.S. Department of Justice here.
Granted, these are all murders, not just those in school buildings, but it makes you wonder why the media is just picking up on this now.
Slashdot Mirror
I live in Cambridge, MA, and I used ZipCar for about three years. When I came to Boston from Kentucky, the first thing I noticed was that driving here really sucks. Besides that, I worked in the Back Bay neighborhood, and parking near work was $400 a month. Luckily, Boston has an excellent public transportation system, so for about $60 a month, I got a subway/bus pass. At that point, I realized that I was only driving two Saturdays a month. So, these two Saturdays were costing me $450 a month ($350 car payment & $100 a month insurance). It was officially cheaper to rent a car for those two days. So I got rid of my car.
This was two years before ZipCar came into existance. Renting a car from a traditional rental agency involves going to the agency during their working hours, standing in line (frequently 1/2 hour), filling out paperwork, and returning the car during working hours. It makes no sense to rent the car for less than a day. Thus when ZipCar started up, and the booking time became 5 minutes at home and you could book for a couple hours, it was huge.
It was only when I moved to the far west side of Cambridge, where it's easier to find a parking space near the house and there aren't 7 ZipCars within walking distance (in fact there isn't even 1) that I decided it was time to get a new car.
From a geek standpoint, the system is extremely cool. The company issues you a card key associated with your account. You reserve the car on-line. A cell based system in the car is alerted to let the car know when you've rented it. During your rental time your card key unlocks the doors and the ignition. You can continue to drive if you go past the quiting time, but they charge you $25 for being late. In Boston, you're always late because of traffic, so it's cheaper just to rent the car for 1/2 hour or hour more than you think you'll need it.
So in answer to some of the questions I've seen:
(1) Why don't you just take public transportation? I did 95% of the time.
(2) Is it reliable? Yes. The $25 late fee seems to insure that the car is back on time. I never had to wait for the car to be returned.
(3) Is it dirty? No. There is a $50 charge for trashing the car.
(4) Is it wrecked? For whatever reason, the cars had very few dings. If the car is in a serious accident, it is taken out of commission. The company contacts the current renters and rebooks them to different cars.
(5) Who does the maintenance / washes the cars? The company does. If you want to wash the car yourself, the company reimburses you.
(6) Does it make sense in every town? No, only in very dense cities that have good public transportation.
(7) Isn't it expensive? Not compared to the price of owning a car in a big city.
(8) Is it convenient? Yes. In Boston / Cambridge there are a ton of cars. Until I moved far enough away from the central part of the city, it was pretty easy to find a car near my home or work free at any given time (except holiday weekends).
(9) Will it impress a woman? No, but she lives in the city, too. Meet her at a coffee shop and then take her to a nice restaurant.
With 130,000 sixth grader with wireless internet access, the state of Michigan has just become the center of the P2P file sharing universe ...
When Professor Gies talks of "the community of trust," he is specifically speaking about the University of Virginia Honor Code. This is a formalized institution at UVa, consisting of the following components.
1) In order to be accepted to the University, a student must read and sign the Honor Code rules and regulations (mainly don't cheat, don't help others cheat, turn in cheaters, understand that everyone will be doing this, too). I think in 1986 when I applied to UVa (I didn't go there), one of the essays on the application required me to tell the University what I thought about the Honor Code.
(2)Whenever anyone takes an exam or turns in a project at UVa, they are required to append and sign a statement that says something to the extent of "On my honor, I have neither given nor received aid on this work."
3) Anyone caught cheating is tried before a council of students, not professors, and can be expelled from the university.
As you can see, the University has tried to create a community where honesty and personal integrity are created and maintained by the student body, not imposed by the University Administration. I'm certain that this is the "community of trust" that was referred to.
BTW, this accusation of wide spread cheating is a huge black eye to the University. They pride themselves in the Honor Code as something that sets them apart from other schools. If it turns out that their students are ignoring it, part of their self-perceived elite reputation is seriously tarnished.
I was curious if kids are really more likely to commit murder now than in the past, so I did a little research. The results are pretty interesting.
From 1986 to 1993 there was a huge spike in murders of and by people aged 14 to 24. From 1993 to 1999, however, the number of teenage related murderers has steadilly dropped to the same level as it was in 1976. I have no numbers for 2000 or projections for 2001, but it certainly seems that the problem is not nearly as bad as it used to be.
Don't believe me? Check out the report by the U.S. Department of Justice here.
Granted, these are all murders, not just those in school buildings, but it makes you wonder why the media is just picking up on this now.