Sustainable mobility solutions: a pre-implementation questionnaire study for carsharing

This article presents a pre-implementation questionnaire study for a new carsharing system in La Rochelle, France. The questionnaire seeks responses on four main factors: profile of the users, transportation behaviour of users, willingness to use carsharing and preferences for new carsharing stations in La Rochelle. The target groups surveyed were city residents, tourists, businessmen, students and city transport organisations namely city of La Rochelle, CdA La Rochelle and Conseil Generale du Charente Maritime. A total of 500 questionnaires were distributed in-person and a response rate of 81.4% was received. The findings of this study reveal useful information on the feasibility of the offer, user motivations and service design aspects for the new carsharing system. It was found during the study that appropriate marketing strategies and awareness campaigns are required to inform people about carsharing. Other areas of improvement are ensuring availability of vehicles at times, easy access to carsharing stations, easy return procedure for vehicles after use, low trip costs and providing vehicles suited to user needs. These findings have strengthened the need for a new carsharing system in the city and have identified appropriate operational factors for its implementation.