Livable Streets Film Festival

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Dwight Mengel, 274-5605, dwight.mengel@dfa.state.ny.us
Tom Knipe, 274-5575, tknipe@tompkins-co.org
What: Livable Streets Film Festival (open to the public)
When: Thursday, September 22, 8 p.m. Doors open at 7:45 pm.
Cost: Free
Where: Cinemapolis, 120 E Green Street, Ithaca Commons, Ithaca, NY, 277-6105
Web: IthacaCarshare.org

Livable Streets Film Festival: A Screening of 21 short films by StreetFilms and FilmedByBike

Ithaca, NY (September 6, 2011)— The Livable Streets Film Festival is a free public event in downtown Ithaca presenting twenty-one short films showing how people can live and be mobile in the 21st Century by creating alternatives to conventional car culture. Drawing on examples from Portland, Oregon to Portland, Maine and places beyond, 21 short films provide an off-beat and humorous take on creating sustainable mobility and great urban neighborhoods. A local jury selected films that represent ideas that can be adapted to Upstate New York. Other films were chosen on the you-have-to-see-it-to-believe-it principle. The primary sources of films are StreetFilms.org and the Filmed-By-Bike Film Festival.

StreetFilms produces short films that show how smart transportation design and policies can result in better places to live, work and play. They package complex concepts into easy to understand and accessible videos. Filmed By Bike is a bike-themed movie festival held annually in Portland, Oregon. Drawing on submissions from all over the world, the films display bike culture in its great diversity.

Attendees will leave with inspiring new ideas for creating livable streets in their own communities.

The Livable Streets Film Festival will be held on Thursday September 22nd at Cinemapolis, 120 East Green Street, Ithaca Commons. Doors open at 7:45pm, and the program begins at 8:00 pm. Admission is free and there will be door prizes.

This is a public event sponsored by the Upstate Transportation Forum being held in Ithaca on September 22-23, Porter & Curtis Insurance, Ithaca Carshare, NYSERDA and NYSDOT. For more information visit www.IthacaCarshare.org.

Contact for Upstate Transportation Forum: Dawn LaMorte, 607-379-1844, sunrisestudiosdesign@gmail.com

 

Upstate Transportation Forum Speaker Highlight

Help us promote the 2011 Transportation Forum by sharing this email with your contacts! 

Registrations are still being accepted for the 2011 Upstate Transportation Forum on September 22-23rd. Visit www.ithacacarshare.org and register now!

Transportation Forum Speaker Highlight!

Brian Kehoe is the Executive Director of the New York Bicycling Coalition since January of 2011. Previously he was a Planner at the Livingston County Planning Department and at the City of Poughkeepsie, NY. Throughout his career Brian has worked on several key initiatives including his role as a Planner for the Walkway Over the Hudson project and acting as Poughkeepsie’s liaison to the Dutchess County Metropolitan Planning Organization. Brian also designed and procured funding for the Bicycle Route System for Poughkeepsie. Brian feels there are many opportunities for improvement to our transportation options. “Transportation is fundamental to the human experience, to civilization,” he says. “While human transport exacts a big toll on the environment, human scale transportation also provides a great degree of independence.” Brian will be presenting on “Design for People” and hopes that attendees will be inspired to get out in their communities, make connections and change their local transportation system to better serve their needs. Brian resides in Catskill, NY with his wife, three year old son and will soon welcome another child to his family. He keeps busy in his free time spending time with his family, gardening and playing guitar. 

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More about the Transportation Forum….

The Forum will explore examples from Tompkins County and across Upstate New York to inspire your next partnership. Over the span of two days a variety of topics will be covered at the forum including carsharing, active transportation, new technologies, partnering with big business, and using local talent and resources. You will also have the opportunity to extend your stay in Ithaca by adding a Friday afternoon field-trip to your conference package.

Register now for the early bird price of only $50 ($35 for students) at www.ithacacarshare.org. 

KEYNOTE SPEAKER
We are excited to have Susan Zielinksi, the Managing Director of SMART (Sustainable Mobility & Accessibility Research & Transformation) as our keynote luncheon speaker. Susan comes to us from Ann Arbor Michigan where she spent a year as a Harvard Loeb Fellow focusing on New Mobility innovation and leadership. Prior to 2004, she cofounded and directed Moving the Economy (MTE), a Canada-wide “link tank” that works to catalyze and support sustainable urban transportation innovation as well as New Mobility industry development. She has advised on a wide range of local, national, and international transportation efforts. As a transportation planner for the City of Toronto for over 15 years, she worked developing and leading transportation and livability policies and initiatives.

HOSTED BY
This conference is hosted by Ithaca Carshare in partnership with NYSERDA, NYSDOT and many other partners including: TCAT, Ithaca College, Tompkins County, Ithaca Tompkins County Transportation Council, Way2Go, VisitIthaca.com, Downtown Ithaca, Cornell University and the City of Ithaca.

MORE INFORMATION
For more information about the Transportation Forum visit www.ithacacarshare.org or email conference planner Dawn LaMorte at 2011Forum@ithacacarshare.org. You can also call 607-379-1844. There are still several sponsorship opportunities available. Call or email for details!

 

Making Reservations on the Go!

You’ve asked for it, and we’ve listened. Making reservations on the go is now easier than ever with our new mobile reservations page. If you have a mobile device that can display a webpage,  just point it to http://reserve.ithacacarshare.org/m. iPhone users have a specialized display that makes it a little more pleasing to the eye, but whether you’re on an iPhone or another device, making or changing reservations is now quicker and easier than ever when you’re not in front of your computer.

So go check it out! Just use this link.

 

Introducing our first minivan and two new locations

We are happy to announce that, after many requests from members, Ithaca Carshare now has a minivan! The silver Nissan Quest seats 7, with rear seats that fold down for bulky loads. It’s at W State/MLK and Corn and available for reservations now. 

This minivan and an additional Nissan Versa hatchback are made possible by generous support from the Park Foundation‘s Sustainable Ithaca program, which has transportation as a key topic area.We’re also adding two new spots as part of our collaborative mobility project with the Way2Go program of Cornell Cooperative Extension and the Greater Ithaca Activities Center. The project, which also covers our Easy Access Plan, aims to bring more affordable and sustainable transportation options to low-income and under-served populations.

Look for new permanent Ithaca Carshare locations at the intersection of Clinton and Plain, and another on West Hill along TCAT‘s Route 14 within the next few weeks!

 

Help us name our new vehicles!

New cars need new names! Help us name our two new cars- $25 to the winner! Last year, our members were a great help in naming our cars. We liked your ideas so much in fact, that we’re relying on you all again to help us come up with fun and creative names for the new vehicles. Winning names will be fairly short (max of 8-9 letters) and have something interesting to do with Ithaca or its people, present or past. Submit entries by e-mail to info@ithacacarshare.org by March 30, 2011. Members who submit winning names will get a $25.00 driving credit, plus the honor of your name proudly displayed on the car!

 

Tompkins County Zimride Launches Online tool makes ride sharing easier than ever

Share the cost of your commute trips and other trips too! This recently launched website is a powerful tool to help match rides for all who work, live, and study in Tompkins County. Post your trip online and be paired with potential drivers or riders who share your route and contribute to the cost of gas. You can choose to sign up as a community member or select just to share rides within the Cornell, Ithaca College, or TC3  community. Ithaca Carshare members, share cars and rides at the same time! Splitting the costs of your Ithaca Carshare trips can make it even more affordable! 

 

Carsharing Association

Ithaca Carshare helps found international Carsharing Association!

18 carsharing organizations commit to put environmental and social benefits ahead of profit

Unlike “cars on demand” services, member carsharing organizations are “transit-oriented” services, encouraging carsharing as part of a sustainable transportation network of choices that includes walking, cycling, and transit.

The Association’s member organizations span from Sydney to Halifax to Minneapolis to Sao Paolo and represent approximately 100,000 members across the globe. CSA members include innovators of carsharing in North America, the oldest of which has been operating since 1994. Ithaca Carshare is one of the smaller organizations, along with our neighbors Buffalo CarShare.

Listen to WHCU 870AM this Saturday at 8:15 am for more, or check out the press release.

 

PRESS RELEASE- Ithaca Carshare Rolls Past 1,000 Member Milestone

Ithaca Carshare Rolls Past 1,000 Member Milestone

(Ithaca, NY; January 11, 2011) Owning a car is more expensive than most people realize. Local not-for-profit Ithaca Carshare helps address the high costs of driving through sharing. Members can make reservations as short as 15 minutes, allowing them to pay for car use only during the times they actually need it.

“When you own a car, you pay for it even when you’re not using it.” explains member Elisabeth Harrod. “Carsharing encourages you to plan ahead and to combine trips, and it also means you don’t ever have to worry about taking a car to the shop.”

Now in their third year of operation, Ithaca Carshare celebrates successes and welcomes their 1,000th member. The new Easy Access plan, designed for limited-income households, represents a bold stride forward in affordable transportation for Ithacans.

Taking into account car maintenance, insurance, gas, taxes and finance payments, AAA estimates that the average cost of owning a car is $400-650 per month. Ithaca Carshare covers all those costs. The most active Ithaca Carshare drivers spend an average of under $100 per month. For income-qualified Easy Access members, the costs are even lower. For those with low incomes who may be completely dependent on buses and taxis, having affordable access to a reliable car can make the difference in getting to a medical appointment, job interview, or picking up a sick child unexpectedly. Thanks to federal grant funds, the Easy Access plan is available at significantly reduced rates to members within eligible income limits.

Wendy Gutman, a Southside Ithaca resident who walks and bikes frequently, joined Ithaca Carshare on the Easy Access plan this summer when her car was in the shop. “Carshare makes it easy to own one or zero cars and to be able to be simultaneously money and eco-conscious,” says Gutman. “It felt great teaching our kids that even adults need to learn how to share!”

Carsharing is good for the community and the environment too. In a recent study, PhillyCarShare found that each of its cars kept approximately 15.3 private cars off the road. With 1,000 members sharing 13 vehicles, Ithaca Carshare is helping reduce parking and traffic congestion in Ithaca. Carshare members tend to bike, walk, and rideshare for more trips, and also combine daily errands into one trip. This means they drive less than most car owners, which has a positive impact on carbon emissions.

Ithaca Carshare has seen steady growth since day one. Approving its one thousandth active member is an important benchmark for this local not-for profit, showing that carsharing is a viable transportation option. The Ithaca Carshare fleet includes twelve cars and a truck that can be driven anywhere, and are available to members by reservation day and night in convenient locations throughout Ithaca.

 

The End of Ownership: Rethinking Cars in the Age of the Music Cloud

The day I moved all of my belongings to Ithaca College from Central Utah via airplane (this was long before you got charged for bringing multiple bags aboard) I dished over $80.00 for an overweight suitcase stuffed with my large CD collection. Your music isn’t the kind of thing you can just live without. Soon I discovered that I was not only one of the few people in college without a cell phone or personal computer, but the fact that I was still toting a Walkman and case of CDs was unheard of. “You don’t have an iPod?!” they gasped, “Where are you from!?”

By now I’ve accumulated all of the obligatory electronics, and as I familiarize myself with my first iPod (ironically a hand-me-down from none other than my mother who has moved on to an iPod touch), I am just coming to terms with kissing my CD collection goodbye and joining the world of paid online music downloads. But it looks like I’m just catching on to the tail end of the iPod phase as everyone else moves towards accessing their music from the ‘Music Cloud.’

Similar to the online NetFlix model that resulted in all those gutted out Blockbusters and Hollywood video stores, online music streaming companies such as Rhapsody, Napster, and most notably, Spotify in Europe offer free or cheap access by subscription to the ‘Music Cloud’. Essentially this means anywhere you can access the internet (which seems like almost anywhere these days – soon we’ll be streaming downloads straight from the chips in our brains), you can play any album you want. At any time. That’s almost any album ever recorded. So why would we continue spending money on owning select albums that we like when we could instead channel that money towards services that allow us to listen those same albums and also unlimited other music? You have the flexibility to listen to an album or artist just to see if you like it without even having the obligation (or sunk cost) to listen to it again if you didn’t like it.

Why pay to own something when you can have equal or better access to the same thing for a lower price? Those sharing values that mom always emphasized when you were a kid that haven’t always applied in our fiercely independent culture are finally starting to catch on for adults. As we start to see fewer people owning a video or music collection, also we will see less people choosing to own and maintain pricier assets, such as cars.

The average car owner spends $8,000 dollars a year to own, fuel, insure, and maintain their vehicles. At Ithaca Carshare, $8,000 could buy a year of membership for 2 drivers, 22 hours of reserved time per week, and 10,000 miles of driving at Ithaca Carshare! That comes out to 3.2 hours and 27.4 miles per day. That much driving is far in excess of what most people actually need (and those who do drive that much probably want to own a car, or reconsider their driving habits). For the thousands of Tompkins County residents who live near a carshare location or a TCAT line, having on-demand access to Ithaca Carshare’s ‘Car Cloud’ makes a lot more sense than dishing out all the costs to own one, regardless of whether or not you use it. While the amount members spend monthly on carsharing varies widely from driver to driver, it is very infrequent that an Ithaca Carshare member pays more in a month than the amount of a monthly car loan and insurance payment plus a month worth of gasoline.

While Ithaca has something of a reputation for being liberal, progressive, and ‘out there,’ we are absolutely not alone on this one. As of July 2010, there were 46 carsharing programs in North America with 448,574 members sharing approximately 10,405 vehicles. That’s 42 people per vehicle. Without carsharing each one of those people may own a personal car.

It doesn’t take a genius to do the math on this one. Carsharing means fewer vehicles on the roads(research shows up to 15 personal vehicles removed for each carsharing vehicle), and gives people convenient and affordable access to a car when they need it. People think twice about each reservation when they pay per trip. The result? Members are drive less in fuel efficient vehicles, emit less C02, and create less traffic and parking congestion. People save money (which can be spent locally on other things) while still being able to get around without having to ride a bike to the grocery store in a hailstorm to pick up a 50 pound bag of dog food.

It may be a few years yet before you can stream your favorite music from the music cloud directly into the sound system of a carshare car, so hang on to that iPod for now. But if those monthly car payments are killing you, or your vehicle is on its last legs, it’s time to rethink vehicle ownership. The amount you might make from selling your car will buy you plenty of trips with Ithaca Carshare, though I can’t promise anything about those old CD’s. Mine are still under the bed collecting dust…

 

Birthday Party tonight

6:00-8:00 pm at the Women’s Community Building (100 W. Seneca St.)

Come meet the voices behind the Ithaca Carshare phone number tonight at our Annual Birthday Party! This is your chance to come meet the Ithaca Carshare staff and board and your fellow carsharers (you never know who has a great carsharing tip that you haven’t figured out yet…). And if that doesn’t entice you enough, Thai food from Sticky Rice, chocolate birthday cake, and door prizes should do it!