Three years after expanding to the North Shore, popular car-share provider car2go is scaling back its North Vancouver availability.
The company announced this week, that it would be eliminating the Lower Capilano, Pemberton Heights and Norgate neighbourhoods from its “home area.” Car2go subscribers can pick up and drop off a Smart Car or Mercedes-Benz B Class from most any street, but starting Feb. 1, the area west of Mackay Avenue is off limits. The northern border remains 29th Street.
“We’ve been looking at the number of rentals, the availability of vehicles and the a mount of time cars sit idle. One of the things that stood out the most for this western-most area of North Vancouver was that cars were sitting considerably longer than they were in the rest of the home area. They were sitting for nine hours on average versus two hours in the rest of Vancouver,” said Justin MacDonald, regional marketing manager for car2go.
MacDonald said the Mackay boundary was picked because Capilano Mall remains a popular pickup and drop-off location. Richmond’s service was cut entirely in the last week as well.
The western portion of North Vancouver’s loss will be the rest of the region’s gain, however.
“We have to balance the availability of cars for all of our members and the sustainability of our business whenever we explore anything like an expansion or possible retraction. In this instance, we believe that by discontinuing service in this area, we’ll be able to reallocate these vehicles to areas where they’re needed the most so our members will benefit more from greater availability,” MacDonald said.
