Share, drive and park anywhere: This has also been possible in Neubiberg for almost six months with the Sixt car sharing vehicles. The municipality is now extending the cooperation in the pilot project with the Pullach car rental company by another six months. The one-year pilot phase has already been completed in Gräfelfing, where station-free car sharing is being introduced on a permanent basis. In a Germany-wide tender, only Sixt GmbH submitted an offer, which had already tested the model in a pilot project.
At the time of the test, Gräfelfing was the first municipality in the Munich area to introduce the car-sharing model on a trial basis, in which cars can be borrowed and returned at any location. According to the city hall, the number of users increased continuously during the one-year trial period. The community contributes to the costs, since the model is even less profitable in the surrounding area than in the city of Munich. The community sees the car sharing model as a building block in the mobility mix and hopes to reduce the number of private cars in the long term.
That is also the goal in Neubiberg, although the decision to continue the pilot project there was quite controversial. The basis was the usage data that Sixt had presented. For example, a survey of 39 customers and new customers revealed that the vehicles were mainly used for trips to and from Munich. Because the participants mainly used the cars for everyday needs, the administration believes that the model can have a positive impact on the community’s carbon footprint. In addition, the number of users increased between November and the end of March.
The municipal council also criticizes the subsidies for the company from Pullach
The monthly financial burden on the community was between 1,700 and 3,100 euros and thus below the maximum agreed downtime costs of 7,500 euros. As in the municipalities of Unterhaching and Gräfelfing, which also started the pilot project, the concept provides for the respective municipality to participate financially and, up to a certain amount, assume the risk of insufficient sales.
Not all municipal councils in Neubiberg support the continuation of the project. For example, Michael Weigle (FDP) sees no ecological advantage because the rental car would be used as an alternative to local public transport. Among other things, Jürgen Knopp (Free Voters) dislikes the fact that the municipality subsidizes a company that can afford the infrastructure itself. Mayor Thomas Pardeller (CSU) said that the cars were also used as an alternative to private cars. He said to Knopp that one could of course ask oneself whether one should pay money. Only no provider has a free-floating offer for the suburban area. The municipality wants to finally evaluate the pilot project after the extension on the basis of further data. Subsequently, a decision is to be made on the establishment of a nationwide car sharing service, for which an award procedure would be sought.