A survey carried out among city residents on behalf of the Ville de Luxembourg earlier this year saw some 72% of respondents saying they would be interested in signing up for a carsharing scheme. The results of the survey were unveiled yesterday by deputy mayor in charge of mobility François Bausch and mayor Paul Helminger. They show that 48 % of respondents said they would not buy a car, or a supplementary car, if they were in a carsharing scheme, while 45% said they would actually get rid of a current car.

The idea of carsharing has been around for several decades but has only really been launched commercially over the last ten years or so. The idea is that registered members can have self-service access to a number of shared cars that are parked in specific spaces throughout the city. In many schemes, members can book a car via their personal computer or mobile phone.

The Luxembourg City scheme has not even reached the planning stage – the city council will only meet to discuss the viability of establishing a project after the communal elections on October 9. But the current administration has investigated schemes in Belgium (photo of a project in Ghent), Switzerland and Germany and says that the survey results indicate there would be strong demand for a carsharing scheme. This is supported by results that reveal that 74% of those in the city who don’t own a car say that they don’t need their own car or that car ownership is too expensive, and also by the fact that a significant number of car owners clocking up fewer than 20,000 kilometres a year in their vehicles

If the results of the survey were translated into real terms, a carsharing scheme could result in around 500 fewer cars on the capital’s streets, the equivalent of some 2.5km fewer vehicles parked on streets or in car parks.