Krystal Kehoe is excited to get a car share program up and running in Kamloops.
Image Credit: Interior CarShare Co-operative
June 15, 2014 - 10:38 AM
KAMLOOPS — A year ago a small group of people met to talk about the possibility of sharing a single car and now they are ready to begin a membership drive and purchase their first communal vehicle.
“We are registered as a cooperative,” Interior CarShare Co-operative (InCar) chair Krystal Kehoe says. “Members will make the decision on what type of car (to buy).”
The steering committee has been meeting biweekly and have been setting up an information table at the farmer’s market every Saturday. So far about 140 people have signed up though Kehoe is not sure how many will sign up as a founding members, which is what they are looking for now.
“We’ve been working on how we see the car share happening,” she says. "It is a cooperative though, so everyone would get a vote.”
Kehoe says they have been working with the Okanagan car share program ‘OGO’ in Kelowna to help get off the ground. OGO began just last year and has three vehicles on the road.
“Other co-ops are more than happy to help,” she says. “Car sharing is gaining popularity, it’s not just in the bigger cities.”
The idea for a car share came out of an ideas festival hosted by Coun. Arjun Singh last year. In the summer he hosted an information session to gauge community interest. About 14 people showed up to that first meeting but it was enough to get things started. Earlier this year the group put out a survey and another 45 people showed a high level of interest in the program.
“We’ve had a great response,” Kehoe says. “It’s really exciting…. Our goal is to have cars on the road this summer.”
The first official information session of the newly designated co-operative will be held Wednesday, June 18 at Maurya's Fine Indian Cuisine at 165 Victoria St. at 6 p.m. People are asked to RSVP at interiorcarshare.ca.
To contact a reporter for this story, email Jennifer Stahn at jstahn@infotelnews.ca or call 250-819-3723. To contact an editor, email mjones@infotelnews.ca or call 250-718-2724.
News from © iNFOnews, 2014