Paris's Vélib’ program was one of the first large-scale bike-sharing systems when it launched in 2007. Now Paris will be home to Autolib, one of the first electric car-sharing programs. Autolib is scheduled to launch in September of next year with 1,000 battery-recharging stations and 3,000 electric cars. If it works, this program could totally upend the paradigm of urban car ownership.
The worry, of course, is that people might steal and/or trash the Autolib cars the way they did the bikes at first. Even though the bike vandalism story was apparently overblown, these cars are obviously a little more expensive. And as NPR says, "burning cars is practically a national sport in France. Every weekend, hundreds of automobiles are burned by disgruntled youths in cities across the country." Fingers crossed.
Image by faberNovel2009 via Flickr