Car sharing - an (ITS) application for tomorrows mobility

An IT based car sharing system, named City Car Club (CCC), has been developed for greater Helsinki. The CCC reservation system communicates with a vehicle through the GSM (global system for mobile communications) SMS (short message service) messages. There is no need for a call centre to manage the bookings. In addition, the car keys are kept inside the car, instead of having a separate lockers for the key outside the car. Therefore, the users only need a mobile phone and quote the PIN number to open the car doors. Members of CCC can make reservation for a vehicle by Internet and can choose the time frame and location of vehicle that suite them. The subscriber must bring the vehicle back to the parking place where it was reserved for CCC at the time of booking. The door of the vehicle will be locked using the central locking system and the vehicle will be ready for the next subscriber. This system is economically feasible and it requires less manpower compare to call center system for daily operations.