Carpooling
In a Nutshell
Carpooling, also known as ride-sharing and car-sharing, is the act of sharing a vehicle so that more than one person travels in the vehicle at a particular time. Carpooling reduces air pollution, energy use, toll expenses, and stresses of driving. Vehicular wear and tear can also be reduced, since the car will not be traveling as much as it would if the driver did not carpool.
Practical Solution
The “How To”-
Carpool Basics
The most common way carpooling begins is through shared activities or experiences. Coworkers who live close to one another and friends who have children involved in many of the same activities are the frequent starting points of many carpooling agreements. College students, high school students, and parents of students who are too young to drive frequently carpool to and from school in order to save money on gas, save money on parking, decrease the environmental impact, and promote friendships.
If starting your own carpool, a shared desire to carpool is the necessary first step in attracting others to join. You can post notices in the break room at work, ask other parents at your child's school, send out an email, post a notice at church, or advertise through your neighborhood association, for example. Carpooling requires coordination, cooperation, and flexibility and might be best first implemented on a trial basis.
Carpooling Services
There are carpooling services available throughout the St. Louis region. Several organizations offer ridematching services where people looking for a ride or riders can input their information, and the organization will match you with a carpool or vanpool that might work for you. Several of these services are listed under the Discover More tab.
Things to Consider
When using a carpooling service or starting your own at work, it is best to remember that it is not necessarily a permanent solution. Typically if the carpool is not working for you, you can decline to continue using it. Carpooling is flexible, so do not hesitate to schedule doctor appointments, errands, and other responsibilities in fear of breaking the carpool. Lastly, carpool etiquette should not be ignored. Offering money to the driver, remaining seated and unobstructive to the driver, listening to your individually desired music through headphones, and respecting the driver's vehicle are all potential ways of keeping a high level of etiquette while riding.
Other basic rules of the carpool need to be established, as well. Smoking, eating, drinking, talking, and the radio station can all be decided before the carpool begins. Time for pickup and dropoff can also be decided upon, but it is necessary to remember potential traffic and construction delays.
Planning & Zoning-
Parking Preferences
One of the easiest ways to promote ridesharing is to create or designate preferential parking spaces for people who choose to engage in carpooling or vanpooling. Erecting a sign at a certain amount of specific parking spots designating them for carpooling only can encourage individuals to form carpools if the parking spaces are ideal. Hangtags that are placed on the rear-view mirror of a carpool vehicle can serve to indicate that the particular vehicle is allowed to park in the space.
Financial Incentive Programs
Besides parking preferences, another policy organizations can utilize to promote ridesharing may include pre-tax subsidies. Organizations can provide employees with a pre-tax subsidy or allow them to use pre-tax wages strictly for vanpooling.
Carpool Lanes
Governmental bodies can promote carpooling by designating specific carpool lanes on major thoroughfares throughout their community. Often found in the furthest left lanes, carpool lanes can offer a smoother commute with less traffic to those vehicles carrying more than one person. Enforcement would be necessary, but if drivers know they will have a smoother, easier ride by carpooling, there may be increased use.
Liability to Employers
Section 285.200 of the Revised Statutes of Missouri and 625 ILCS 5/10-202 of the Illinois Compiled Statutes remove liability from employers for those employees who choose to participate in a rideshare, vanpool, or carpool activity. In other words, if a vanpool gets into an accident on the way to work, the employer is not liable.
Dollars & Cents-
Costs of Individual Carpool
AAA offers an estimate of the average cost per mile to drive a car, which can be helpful in deciding how much riders should pay the driver. If drivers are taking turns driving, typically the riders do not pay anything as there is distribution of gas, maintenance, and parking costs from all participants in the carpool. Each carpool is different, however, and there is not one clear method of how the cost is determined.
Rideshare offers a calculator to find out how much money can be saved annually by carpooling.
Costs of Using a Carpool Service
RideFinders is a St. Louis regional organization which provides several resources and options available to people looking for ridesharing options. They offer a free ridematching service to carpoolers, a Guaranteed Ride Home service, and other useful information. Enterprise Rideshare also offers opportunities and resources to groups seeking to carpool.
Measuring Success-
The success of carpooling programs and advocacy is best measured by how many people choose to participate in ridesharing activities. The greater the number of people who carpool, the lower the number of vehicles on the road, emissions in the atmosphere, money spent on fuel, and money spent on infrastructure improvements.
State/Federal Carpool Statistics
According to the 2012 American Community Survey produced by the U.S. Census Bureau, roughly 141 million people aged 16 years and older commute to work. Of that 141 million, roughly 13.7 million people, or 9.7 percent, participate in a carpool. About 10.6 million people participate in a 2-person carpool, 1.8 million participate in a 3-person carpool, 675,000 participate in a 4-person carpool, 339,000 participate in a 5 or 6-person carpool, and 283,000 participate in a 7-or-more person carpool.
In comparison, about 107.5 million people drove to work alone.
Local Carpool Statistics
The Transportation Choice metric on the OneSTL Indicators page tracks workers in the St. Louis region who commute by modes other than single-occupancy vehicle (including by carpooling).
According to the St. Louis Regional Clean Air Partnership, 5.3 million of the 7.2 million vehicular trips St. Louisans make each day are single-occupancy trips. In addition, one person riding in a carpool or vanpool can save the environment 225 pounds of emissions every year. Lastly, the Partnership reports that the average commuter can save about $3,500 per year by ridesharing to work.
In 2010, the St. Louis Post Dispatch reported that 9,800 people in the St. Louis region pool to work through RideFinders.
According to the Director of RideFinders, Joseph Wright, as of October 7th 2013, RideFinders has 3,313 registered carpools transporting 7,356 carpoolers.
Future Goals and Success
Although slightly higher than the national average, the number of people who rideshare to work in the St. Louis region is still very low. Advocacy and information needs to continue to be dispersed throughout the region. Workers within the St. Louis region love their cars. The only way more people are going to carpool is if the information is readily available, the workers are interested in carpooling, and organizations like RideFinders and Enterprise Rideshare continue to exist.
Case Studies
Discover More-
Commute Solutions offers information regarding frequenty asked questions about carpooling.
The Missouri Department of Transportation offers links to Missouri's ridesharing websites.
RideFinders is a St. Louis regional organization which provides several resources and options available to people looking for ridesharing options. They offer a free ridematching service to carpoolers, a Guaranteed Ride Home service, and other useful information.
Enterprise Rideshare also offers opportunities and resources to individuals and groups seeking a carpool or vanpool. The website offers information regarding how to set up a vanpool, how to use the federal Transportation Incentive Program subsidy, and other useful information.
Section 132(f) of the Internal Revenue Service Code offers Qualified Transportation Fringe Benefits to commuters for their use of carpooling practices. In 2013, commuters could exclude up to $245 per month in transit benefits. These Qualified Transportation Benefits are excluded from an employee's gross income for income tax purposes and are excluded from an employee's wages for payroll tax purposes.
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