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The volunteer food project in Rotherhithe has provided a large number of cooked meals weekly for two years to elderly residents and needy locals in southeast London. However, the group's plans face major disruption by the announcement that they will not have use of New Year’s Day.

This organization depended on Zipcar, the car-sharing company that allowed its cars from the street. The company caused shock through the capital when it said it would shut down its UK operations from 1 January.

This means many volunteers will be unable to pick up supplies from a major food charity, which gathers surplus food from grocery stores, cafes and restaurants. Other options are less convenient, costlier, or lack the same flexible hours.

“The impact will be massively,” stated Vimal Pandya, the project's founder. “Personally me and my team are concerned by the logistical challenge we will face. Many groups like ours are going to struggle.”

“Faced with this reality, they are all worried and thinking: ‘How will we continue?’”

A Significant Setback for Urban Car-Sharing

The community kitchen’s drivers are among over 500,000 people in London who were car club members, now potentially left without easy use to vehicles, avoiding the burden and cost of ownership. Most of those people were probably with Zipcar, which had a near-monopoly position in the city.

This shutdown, subject to consultation with employees, is a big blow to hopes that vehicle clubs in cities could reduce the need for owning a car. Yet, some analysts have noted that Zipcar’s exit need not spell the end for the concept in Britain.

The Promise of Shared Mobility

Car sharing is prized by many urbanists and green advocates as a way of mitigating the problems associated with vehicle ownership. Typically, vehicles sit as two-tonne dead weights on the street for the vast majority of the time, occupying parking. They also require large CO2 output to produce, and people without a vehicle tend to use active travel and take transit more. That benefits cities – reducing congestion and pollution – and improves people’s health through increased activity.

Understanding the Decline

The company started in 2000 before being bought by the American rental giant Avis Budget in 2013. Zipcar’s UK revenues were minimal compared with its owner's overall annual revenue, and a deficit that grew to £11.7m in 2024 gave little incentive to continue.

Avis Budget has said the closure is part of a “wider restructuring across our global operations, where we are taking targeted actions to simplify processes, enhance profitability”.

Its latest financial reports noted revenues had declined as drivers took fewer and shorter trips. “This trend reflect the continuing effect of the cost-of-living crisis, which continues to suppress demand for discretionary spending,” it said.

London's Unique Hurdles

However, industry observers noted that London has specific problems that made it much harder for the company and its rivals to succeed.

• Patchwork Policies: Across 33 boroughs, car-club operators face a patchwork of varying processes and costs that made it harder.
• New Costs: The closure coincides with electric cars start paying London’s congestion charge, adding extra expenses.
• Parking Permit Disparity: Locals in some boroughs pay just £63 for a year’s electric car parking permit. A similar shared vehicle would pay over £1,100 annually, creating a major disincentive.

“Our fees should be one-twentieth of a private parking cost,” said Robert Schopen of Co Wheels. “We’re taking cars off the street. We’re putting less polluting cars in their place.”

Lessons from Abroad

Other European countries offer models for London to follow. Germany enacted national car-sharing legislation in 2017, providing a unified system for parking, subsidies and waivers. Now, the country has several shared cars per 10,000 people, while France has 2.1 and Belgium has 6.3. The UK lags behind at 0.7.

“What we see is that car sharing around the world, particularly on the continent, is growing,” commented Bharath Devanathan of Invers.

He suggested authorities should start to view vehicle clubs as a form of mass transit, and integrate it with train and bus stations. He added that one unnamed client was looking at entering the London market: “Operators will fill this gap.”

What Comes Next?

The company’s competitors can roughly be divided into two camps:

1. Fleet Operators: Which maintain their own cars. This includes Denmark’s GreenMobility, France’s Free2Move, and Germany’s Miles Mobility.
2. Peer-to-Peer Services: Which allow users to rent out their own vehicles via an app – a kind of Airbnb for cars. Examples Britain’s Hiyacar and the US’s Getaround and Turo.

One company, a US-headquartered peer-to-peer platform, is assessing the UK gap. Rory Brimmer, its UK managing director, said there was a “big opportunity” to win more users. “There is a void that is going to need to be filled, because London still needs to move,” Brimmer said.

Yet, it could take a while for other players to establish themselves. In the meantime, more people may choose to buy cars, and others across London will be without a convenient option.

For the volunteers in Rotherhithe, the next month will be a rush to find a solution. The delivery problem caused by Zipcar’s exit highlights the wider implications of its departure on community groups and the future of car-sharing in the UK.