Why does The Commons support a concept that may to some appear to be so off-beat and marginal as carsharing? Simple! We think it's a great, sustainable, practical mobility idea whose time has come and whose potential impact is quite simply huge. Carsharing: the missing link in your city's sustainable transport system.

Once mainly isolated local projects doing their best to survive under tough conditions, the institutions concerned with carsharing -- CSOs, local government, entrepreneurs, other transporters, public interest groups - are consolidating and now reaching out. Think that this is still a marginal phenomenon involving a few ragged Greens here and there? Check out this listing to see where you can get a shared car in more than 600 cities worldwide. Carsharing? It's already here.

The broader context of World Carshare development and expansion

Carsharing is not an isolated commercial or neighborhood activity. It is part of a much greater whole, and to fully understand its prospects for the future -- and the challenge that need to be met by any successful operation -- it is necessary to have command of this bigger picture as well. Here is one good path to get you started.

The New Mobility Agenda
The World CarShare Consortium is a self-contained program with strong importance as one component of the cluster of inter-related, synergistic programs under our New Mobility Agenda. The leading edge of thinking and practice in the transport field has moved a long way over the last years, and a successful carsharing project must take this into account. The New Mobility Agenda is one good way to get a feel for the important developments that are reshaping the broader policy environment behind carsharing.

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The Commons: Open Society Sustainability Initiative
A shared public space on the Internet, providing a wide open, world-wide, non-government forum with working tools and assembly areas for people and groups concerned with improving our understanding and control of technology as it impacts on people in their daily lives. The bottom line: sustainable development and social justice. The tools

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