Archive for June, 2011

Irking drivers urban policy in Europe

Wednesday, June 29th, 2011

New York Times has an interesting article on how urban policy in some European cities is to irk drivers!

European cities are doing the opposite: creating environments openly hostile to cars. The methods vary, but the mission is clear — to make car use expensive and just plain miserable enough to tilt drivers toward more environmentally friendly modes of transportation.

One  strategy is intentionally making it harder and more costly to park. 

It’s been calculated that a person using a car takes up 115 cubic meters (roughly 4,000 cubic feet) of urban space in Zurich while a pedestrian took three. So on the basis that it’s not really fair to everyone else if you take the car it is getting harder and harder to park.

In Copenhagen,  at the European Environment Agency, the office building ha more than 150 spaces for bicycles and only one for a car, to accommodate a disabled person.

Carless households have increased  from 40 to 45 percent in the last decade, and car owners use their vehicles less.

It does help to have very good public transportation!

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Excess capacity

Friday, June 24th, 2011

Think about the time cost benefit of your car suggests Victoria Carter, Cityhop’s co-founder.

Apparently the world’s more than 850 million cars and small trucks are parked for between 20 to 22 hours a day. The average American spends 18% of their income running a car that’s parked stationary 95% of time.

When she tweeted this staggering fact, a cityhoppa commented that the figure is probably worse for kiwis, ie they probably use their cars even less than this.

Interesting, how we apply time and cost studies to business but rarely ourselves. And if we were to truly look at our patterns of use with our car versus the actual cost we might seriously want to change how we move about.

For more on this read carshare guru Robin Chase, Lend your car and save the world!

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Sharing gets respectable!

Friday, June 17th, 2011

The Guardian had an article by John Elkington about how times may be a-changing and that whereas once people aspired to get a company car or save up for a flasher car these days they are more interested in not owning. ( well in the US, UK and Europe) NZ may have a little way to go.

Elkington noted how we spoke at a conference in Madrid and that “someone from the auto industry noted to a small group of us that what is really spooking them is the fact that young people are beginning to think differently about car ownership.

“Unlike earlier generations, for whom owning a car was a signal of independence, of having arrived, young people these days are showing much less inclination to possess their own car – and, empowered by mobile phones, apps, social networks and start-ups like Go Get, Streetcar, Zipcar, WhipCar and City Car Club, they are increasingly opting for car sharing.

Now there’s a thought!

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Car share gets 2 mentions

Friday, June 10th, 2011

We were interested to read in a recent Reuters article that car share got two mentions in a recent article on how web based sharing is reaching a tipping point. While the concept of sharing cars, tools and so on is still new to consumers, many companies are now adopting this business model so it won’t be long before sharing is mainstream!

Zipcar was obviously there in the list of 10 signs websharing is reaching tipping point, the US car sharing giant debuted in April on the Nasdaq at $30 a share, up 60 per cent on the offer price of $18 !

Then at the end of the list was this: Car Sharing Is the Gateway. According to a report from research firm Latitude called The Sharing Economy, people who try out car-sharing services are more likely to join in other web-based sharing services. Car sharers also share significantly more across categories than non-car sharers.

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Onstreet parking for carshare

Tuesday, June 7th, 2011

 

Cityhop is in today’s NZ Herald.  Pictured  above is Victoria Carter, Co- founder of Cityhop and Bruce Jeffreys Co-founder of Go Get thanks to the NZ Herald.

While here, Bruce asked if we, in Auckland, had the same disease Sydneysiders have, the ‘oh we’re different, it won’t work here,’ syndrome!  Sydneysiders thought car share would never catch on and then  they found they were no different to New York, London, anywhere else in the world where carshare is – with Council support it works! Now it’s accepted as the norm, as it is the world over.

Carsharing encourages people to consider whether they really need a second car when they could catch a bus or train to work and then hire a car for an hour for errands between times.

High petrol prices help focus people’s minds on the need to tie up their resources in a car. Once people join car share the cost of petrol no longer worries them!

 Sydney now has over 473 on street spaces for car share.

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One Watch – One Tree – One Planet

Thursday, June 2nd, 2011

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, the next is now.One of our juicifiers, Ryan, recently bought one of these amazing We Wood watches. They are fast becoming a status symbol amongst stylish and thoughtful people. The watch  is 100% natural wood, hypo-allergenic, completely free of toxic chemicals but still functional thanks to its Miyota movement 

We love the fact these watches are so wholesome. For every watch bought they plant a tree.

WEWOOD from Italy, is fast becoming  an emblem of eco-luxury and design, committed to the health of our planet; the avant-garde approach to sophisticated sustainability.

 Says the website WEWOOD lets us rediscover nature in its beauty, its simplicity and inspired design. It reminds us of a tree’s powerful way of life; rooted, yet reaching.

With no toxic materials the watch is as natural as your wrist.  What a way to make a difference, one watch plants one tree, and helps to ensure the health and survival of the natural world.

The website reports: This year, American Forests’ Global ReLeaf Campaign will plant 4.8 million trees in 43 projects in 14 states and 10 countries to help restore forests important for wildlife, clean water, and carbon sequestration.

There are two types of Global ReLeaf projects:
1) In urban areas, trees are planted through the Global ReLeaf Fund. The program also encourages individuals to plant trees around their homes and businesses or join community groups to plant trees that shade, cool, and beautify their neighborhoods.

2) Most of our trees are planted in ecosystem restoration projects called Global ReLeaf Forests. Many of these areas have been damaged by natural or human causes. These trees help clean the air and water, filter polluted runoff, slow global warming and erosion, and provide habitat for wildlife.

 

 

 

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Cityhop members wins

Wednesday, June 1st, 2011

Cityhop was chuffed to read that cityhop members Mitchell & Stout Architects were winners with a Waiheke Island house in the Residential Architecture – House category in the 2011 NZ Architecture Awards.

“With its poetically generated arrangement of volumes and room, this house, designed as  retreat from work, offers a range of inventive and enjoyable spatial experiences. It offers a few extraordinary moments: the ‘thinking room’, a double height space for music and contemplation; guest sleeping areas that are reminiscent of Ryokan atchitecture and suggestive of treehuts and a brightly painted yellow main bedroom.”

We love seeing our members do well. David Mitchell and Julie Stout are not only imaginative in the way they create houses for clients but also in the way they move about the city. They recognise that individual car ownership isn’t always necessary and when they and their team need to drive somewhere they carshare with Cityhop.

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