Car sharing perspectives in a business as usual scenario: Findings from the STARS project

This paper summarises some interim results of the Horizon 2020 STARS project (http://stars-h2020.eu/) by giving insights on car sharing growth perspectives and expected changes from both operators and policy makers viewpoint. Actions and development plans in the short-medium term that are already being prospected in some European cities by car sharing operators, industrial players and policy makers concur to define the business as usual scenario analysed here and reconstructed through an extensive surveying activity. The analyses take into consideration the perspectives of different categories of car sharing, which are resulting from the classification of 186 existing car sharing services. Services are expected to grow in future, however operators belonging to different categories tend to be more optimistic on the expansion of the kind of service they are providing. Expansion to suburbs and fleets diversification are the most cited likely evolutions, while rising costs of fuel represent the worst threat.