2016 Smart Fortwo Passion Coupe on 2040-cars

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Car2go finds huge customer base waiting in China

Car2go appears to be struggling a bit in the US – ending its electric fleet in San Diego and not announcing any expansions here for a while now – but the news is different in China. After just two months of operations in Chongqing, China, Car2go is serving 78,000 customers. As the company itself admits in the press release below, that's almost as many as use Car2go in a North American or European city after five years in business. There, about 100,000 to 130,000 people use Car2go. Chongqing is Car2go's first location in Asia. Of course, population numbers are different in China. As they say, if you're one in a million in China, there are still 1,000 people just like you. And while you may not have heard of Chongqing, it's a metropolis of 30 million people. The biggest city in the US, New York, has about 20 million in its metropolitan area. And yet, for 30 million potential users and 78,000 actual ones, Car2go offers them just 400 vehicles. Since Car2go has served over 40,000 rentals in its first two months, that means someone is stepping into a blue-and-white Smart Fortwo every 1.7 minutes, on average. Car2go has been thinking about offering short-term A-to-B rentals in China since at least 2014, when we came across a Car2go booth at the Challenge Bibendum there. Related Video: After less than two months, car2go has 78,000 customers in China 07. June 2016 Stuttgart/Chongqing car2go makes free-floating car sharing popular in the Chinese metropolis Chongqing More than 40,000 rentals in the first few weeks A car2go vehicle is rented every 1.7 minutes in Chongqing Stuttgart/ Chongqing – In less than two months, more than 78,000 customers have registered with car2go in China. For comparison: After between four to five years, the biggest car2go locations in Europe and North America have approximately 100,000 to 130,000 registered customers per city. More than 40,000 vehicle rentals within this period mean that one of the 400 car2go vehicles in Chongqing is rented every 1.7 minutes. With this start, car2go has created an important alternative to owning one's own car and thus a valuable addition to the local public transport system in Chongqing with its 30 million inhabitants. "The start in Chongqing far exceeds our expectations", says Roland Keppler, CEO of car2go.

Junkyard Gem: 2008 Smart Fortwo Passion

Even as American drivers tended to choose increasingly massive trucks for their daily commutes, Daimler AG decided that money could be made selling a microscopic two-seater with a 73-1/2" wheelbase here. Sales never met Stuttgart's expectations, but sufficient Smart Fortwos were sold to Americans that used-up examples show up occasionally in the car graveyards I frequent. Today's Junkyard Gem is one of the Fortwos sold here during its optimistic first model year, found in a boneyard in Tulsa, Oklahoma last month. Many European cities allow perpendicular parking on streets for vehicles as short as the Fortwo, which meant that drivers could squeeze two Fortwos into a space that would fit just a single parallel-parked ordinary car. For the most part, this parking method couldn't be done legally in the United States, negating the Smart's primary practicality advantage. Fuel economy wasn't great for such a tiny machine: 33 mph city, 40 mpg highway, worse than the gas mileage of both the 2008 Toyota Prius and Honda Civic Hybrid. Still, fuel prices spiked hard in 2008, with average per-gallon cost of gasoline hitting $4.11 in July of that year (about $5.91 in 2023 dollars), and the Fortwo's decent fuel economy must have helped sales. The curb weight of the '08 Fortwo was just a bit over 1,800 pounds, or about the same as a mid-1980s Honda Civic. In fact, this car's 70 horsepower falls neatly between the 60 horses of the 1985 Honda Civic 1300 and the 76 horses of the 1985 Honda Civic 1500. This car was optimized for one trait, at which it excelled: short overall length. It's even shorter than Japan's kei specifications (its width is too great to allow it to be registered as a kei car in Japan, though Smart eventually made a narrowed Japanese-market version). As the owner and daily driver of a genuine kei van (which gets 60 mpg in town and seats four), the only thing I envy about the Fortwo is its superior highway-speed capability. That's the advantage of a mighty 999cc Mitsubishi three-cylinder over a kei-compliant 658cc Subaru four-cylinder. This is the Passion trim level, which came with air conditioning and this sunroof. The MSRP was $13,590, or about $19,531 in 2023 dollars. It appears that the driver's airbag deployed at some point and was then taped up. That crash damage may have been what doomed this car. After taking a shot at selling electric Fortwos here, Smart gave up on the US-market Fortwo after 2019.

Daimler's Car2go carsharing service expands to Los Angeles

The Beach Boys typified the Southern California lifestyle by famously singing about hot rods, drag races and convertibles (not to mention surfer girls). So we never would've guessed that their hometown would help host a carsharing service featuring squat two-seaters. But times have changed. Mercedes-Benz parent Daimler is bringing its Car2go carsharing service to Southern California on June 6, marking the service's 14th market in North America and its 27th worldwide. Car2go, which features Smart ForTwo two-seaters (almost exclusively) and has more than 700,000 users worldwide, is actually making it a South Bay affair, offering the service in the 28-square-mile area that ranges from El Segundo to Lomita and includes the Beach Boys' hometown of Hawthorne. Fun, fun, fun indeed. Car2go, which says it will provide the Los Angeles region's "first point-to-point" carsharing service, will make 150 ForTwos available at a rate of 41 cents a minute and is offering free registration and 30 minutes of free cruising for a limited period of time. Car2go started service in Rome in mid-March and has been adding new cities at quite a clip since starting out in Ulm, Germany, in 2008. It debuted stateside in Austin, TX in 2009. Check out Car2go's press release about its Los Angeles South Bay operations below, and get more LA details here. car2go Expands Network In Southern California With Point-to-Point Carsharing In The South Bay First Point-To-Point Service in the Los Angeles Region to Be Available On June 6th Free Registration Begins Today For a Limited Time AUSTIN, Texas, May 15, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- car2go North America LLC, the fastest-growing global carsharing company, announced today that it will be expanding its network in Southern California with its pioneering point-to-point carsharing service in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County on June 6th, marking the South Bay as car2go's 14th market in North America and the first in the Los Angeles region. Beginning today, car2go will offer free member registration along with 30 minutes of drive time credit for a limited time at LA.car2go.com using the promotional code SURF. "We are thrilled to become part of the South Bay community by providing the most convenient, true point to point and technologically-advanced carsharing service in the world," said Nicholas Cole, President and CEO of car2go North America.