Sustainable Cities Collective - “We are still making and selling too much stuff,” said James Slezak, the founder of Peers, a sharing economy advocacy organization, at the EcoDistricts Summit in Washington, D.C. This is a “waste of wealth” because more people could simply rent or borrow what they need in our burgeoning “sharing economy.” Why buy a car when you can simply order up a ride on an app? Why book a hotel room when you can stay in someone’s spare bedroom for much less? And why buy something when someone next door has what you need and will lend it to you for free? According to the proponents of the sharing economy, there are so many untapped opportunities to both make money and help other people. This new sharing economy then has huge implications for cities.
Slezak said the average car spends 90 percent of its engine switched off. And then, even when it’s in use, a big percentage of the time the car is idle, stuck in traffic or circling for parking. Why not share a car so it’s used more efficiently? Firms like Uber and Lyft enable this through a “less centralized model of ownership.” The same can be said for places to stay. Some people only use their apartments — or rooms in their apartments — some of the time. On Airbnb, users can rent out that extra space and make some money, while providing someone with a low-cost place to stay. “Instead of saying we have 600,000 hotel rooms, cities should say they have 600,000 apartments available.”
Still, many cities are only tip-toeing into the sharing economy, as there are many issues to work out. For one, how should sharers be regulated, given they are providing a form of service? The companies themselves still seem to be wading through these issues, too. Slezak said some questions still need to be answered, like: “What’s the impact on local communities? What’s the impact on people with jobs in the old model economy? Will the new sharing economy be equitable? What if someone has nothing to share?”
As Sharon Feigon, head of the Shared-Use Mobility Center, explained, at its best, sharing “increases options and helps us do things in a more efficient way.” But, there are definitely winners and losers. NYC taxi drivers, who can spend up to $1 million for a medallion, are fending off unregulated drivers taking their business. In San Francisco, the city is having a hard time finding cab drivers because drivers see Uber or Lyft as better opportunities.
She is focused on ensuring all ages — not just Millennials — benefit from sharing. This may be getting harder as the sharing economy is increasingly driven by a new set of corporations, whereas in the past sharing was a mostly non-profit endeavor. The private company Uber, with 1.2 million car sharers, is now worth $18 billion. Many other car sharing services have been purchased by established car rental companies (Avis, Hertz, etc).
For Daan Weddephol, founder of Peerby, sharing has great social value, but it won’t be lucrative for him unless he can convince everyone to do it. Peerby enables users of their web site to share “power tools, camping gear, things you only use once in a while.” Weddepohl said “80 percent of things we own could be shared. We have all this overcapacity that we can put into a system.”
Peerby matches those who need something with someone close by willing to lend it. “We fulfill 85 percent of requests in 30 minutes.” The web site makes money by offering optional insurance for damage or loss.
2 comments:
I've been trying for years to get public libraries and school systems to embrace the idea of providing resource centers, where people who live in flats can come and build things they need, repair their car, or do other things that they can't do at home. School systems have shop facilities that sit idle through the evenings and weekends. They'd be perfect test installations, since they already exist.
Zero success.
In theory, I love the sharing economy, but in truth some sharing options work a lot better than others.
For example, I've read too many horror stories about Uber, Lyft, and Airbnb to want to go that route for sharing. Stories about men offering rides to women on Uber and Lyft. As the ride proceeds the woman ends up escaping in terror from some guy who does Uber so he can get women alone in his car and harass them. People who have offered rooms or their dwellings on Airbnb only to come home to a trashed and looted house, or find the short term roommate in their bedroom standing over them when they wake up at 3 am. The sharing companies don't always offer support for when things go bad, and usually try to keep the 2 parties apart until the share is actually happening, and it's too late to avoid the creep knowing your home address.
I live in a neighborhood that has a tool lending library, that works great, and gardening groups that hold seed swaps and scion exchanges. But the things that seem to work best for sharing are grassroots organizations.
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