Introduction
While travelling into the Sydney CBD recently I noticed the unusual sight of six Mercedes "Smart Cars" stacked about 12 m high. This turned out to be a promotion for the Charter Drive company. This is a Carsharing scheme.
Carsharing is a system where a fleet of cars (or other vehicles) is owned and operated/overseen by a company, public agency, cooperative, ad hoc grouping, or even a single individual, and made available for use by members of the carshare group in a wide variety of ways. The costs and troubles of vehicle purchase, ownership and maintenance are transferred to a central organizer ...
From Carsharing, Wikipedia, July 2006
Unlike the GoGet car sharing service, which is based in inner city terrace house suburbs, Charter seems to be concentrating on new high rise apartment residents in the city CBD. Also GoGet use larger (but still small) Toyota Yaris vehicles and some utility vehicles, whereas Charter are using Mercedes city cars.
Carsharing systems depend on Vehicle Management Software and RFID devices for customer access. GoGet use keyfob RFID devices, whereas Charter are using Contactless Smart Card.
This is my second unusual sighting of a smart car near the Sydney Central Railway station and Railway Square; the other was a police car. This location is near the Railway Square Youth Hostel.