Rather than buying or leasing cars, governments are beginning to borrow cars from Zipcar Inc., the expanding  car sharing network,  has been awarded a blanket purchase agreement by the U.S. General Services Administration's Office of Motor Vehicle Management  as a vendor for the Federal government's Short Term Rental (STR) program.
  This marks the first time that car sharing has officially been part of the GSA Fleet's list of approved vendors for  Federal government entities, which now have access to Zipcar's entire fleet of car sharing vehicles in the company's 12 major U.S. markets. The term of the BPA is from October 6, 2011, through September 30, 2012, with four one-year options to renew.
  The GSA Fleet selection comes after several other city and state government contracts that Zipcar has recently secured.  The company also has signed a new contract with the State of Illinois's Department of Central Management Services to provide car sharing to state employees. "Alternative transportation is an important part of our efforts to reduce costs and improve efficiency, while helping to reduce our environmental impact," said CMS acting director Malcolm Weems.  "Through this partnership with Zipcar, we will lower costs by paying for vehicles only when needed and help minimize emissions by using Zipcar's fuel-efficient fleet of cars."
Through Zipcar's Z4G - Zipcar for Government    program, which offers a number of state agencies will have on-demand access to nearly 500 Zipcar vehicles currently located across the city of Chicago, as well as a new fleet of vehicles in the city of Springfield.  State employees will be able to reserve Zipcars as needed for state business use 24 hours a day, seven days a week, with the State paying only for the time the car is actually reserved.
 In March 2011, Zipcar announced a partnership with the City of Chicago to provide an integrated fleet and car sharing solution for city agencies, and in October 2010 launched a partnership with the City of New York to provide car sharing memberships to Department of Transportation (DOT) employees as a part of a pilot program.  In Washington D.C., Zipcar launched a program called Fleet Share in April 2009, which provides FastFleet technology to 50 departments and agencies throughout the District.  Zipcar also provides a range of car sharing and FastFleet technology services to a variety of additional City, County and State government entities including the cities of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Sacramento, Portland, OR; Cambridge, MA; and Wilmington, DE; as well as to the county of Santa Cruz.
"We are proud to offer our car sharing services and FastFleet technology to a broad spectrum of government entities on the Federal, State, City and County levels.  Zipcar fits into a new era when governments are trying to do more with less by utilizing new technologies, methods and practices," said Zipcar Chairman and CEO, Scott Griffith.  "Our partnerships across a range of government agencies have already helped to create efficiencies and streamline costs for many levels and facets of government.  We are thrilled by the Federal government's addition of Zipcar to the GSA Fleet program," he said. By Joseph Szczesny