10 February 2012
News Release: New car club to launch in Dundee
***News release issued on behalf of Wheelshare:
Wheelshare
NEWS RELEASE
For immediate use: Thursday 9 February 2012
New Car Club Launching in Dundee
A new Dundee car club is to be launched at the Kydd Building of Abertay University on Friday 10th February, 10.30am to 12.30pm. In collaboration with Wheelshare and Commonwheels Car Club, Solar Cities Scotland has paved the way for Dundee businesses and residents to enjoy a low-cost, problem free and green alternative to vehicle ownership. Organisations and businesses will find the Car Club a benefit as the scheme offers staff access to more 'pool' cars for business travel.
Alistair McLeod of SCS said "Not only is the environmental aspect encouraging people to use the scheme, there are big cost savings in not having to run, insure and maintain a car."
Once registering as a member of Commonwheels, a car can be booked online or over the phone and then collected from a city centre parking bay using a smartcard. Cars can be booked from as short a period as half an hour. Members are charged £4.25 per hour and 19p per mile for trips with discounted rates for longer bookings.
Paul Balmont from Commonwheels said "People are becoming really aware of the true cost of car ownership. The car club allows people to give up their car but provides easy access to a vehicle when they need one."
Commonwheels is a Social Enterprise, meaning profits are invested back into the car club instead of to shareholders. Vehicles are located UK-wide and are available to book where and when you need one.
Anyone interested in finding out more is welcome to pop along to the launch where Club vehicles will be on display or, can find Commonwheels online at
www.commonwheels.org.uk
This scheme is one of a number of car clubs being developed as part of the
Developing Car Clubs in Scotland programme, funded by Transport Scotland and delivered by Carplus.
ENDS
***Note to Press:
* Carplus, an environmental transport NGO with a decade of experience of car clubs and car-sharing, see: http://www.carplus.org.uk/
* In Scotland there are already car clubs in Edinburgh and Glasgow and a new car club is due to launch in Aberdeen early in 2012. There is also a network of community-run car clubs. There are now in excess of 5,670 car club members in Scotland using more than 123 car club vehicles
***Contacts:
Enquiries regarding Dundee car club:
Ann Millar, Development Officer, Wheelshare
ann@wheelshare.org.uk
07761286372
Enquiries regarding 'Developing Car Clubs in Scotland' programme:
Matt Eastwood, Carplus
matt@carplus.org.uk
07572 464753
END OF NEWS RELEASE