Park Carpool achieves 99% availability

Our community car club – Park Carpool – continues to thrive. During the month of January, a car was available for more than 99% of the time! In other words there were only 4 hours in that month when all 7 of our cars were booked out. Since we increased the number of cars back in November it seems that we can provide a better service to our members, since there will now almost always be a car available when they need one.

We currently have 33 members, and we are open to more people joining. We currently have 6 cars stationed at The Park and 1 in Findhorn village, near Station House. If more people living in the village joined we would be able to buy a second car to base there. And we have also been considering whether to place a car at the other end of the village – e.g. around Dunes Road or Fyrish Road.

The main advantage of car clubs is that, unless you use a car every day, it is likely to be a more affordable way of meeting your needs for flexible transport.

We changed our pricing scheme last year to make membership more affordable for people who do not use a car so often. The monthly membership fee is now just £15. And if you do not use the cars at all in a particular month, then you only pay half that - £7.50. On top of that, members pay 52p for each hour they have a car booked out. The carpool pays for petrol, and mileage charges start at 18p a mile – to cover the cost of fuel.

Car clubs also have a positive effect on reducing our ecological footprint. Research has shown that when each journey has a cost associated with it, then we become more aware of transport choices. Thus, carpool members tend to use other transport methods (like walking, cycling, buses and trains) more often than private car owners.

If you might be interested in joining Park Carpool and would like more details, please contact me on carpool.admin@findhorn.cc or 01309 691 934.

Love, Gordon McAlpine.