It has been 2 cars and a suv since I last owned anything with a manual transmission. Call it the 7 year itch or the early signs of a midlife crisis but it has been on my mind daily. Who knew a manual transmission (and the sound of a v8) would get to me like this? I just want a few hours in a car that I could care less about the fact it has 3 rows, or that I can cram an entire Saturdays worth of errands in the back in one swoop or that it gets good gas mileage as a suv. BORING. I want the oohh with the ahhh! I crave the speed that goes along with each gear. I need to remind myself that I know I can still do it then happily return to Bob (my basic suv) knowing my itch had been scratched until the next time.
The problem is it’s not exactly an easy task to just get your hands on such car so what is a girl to do? Our local dealerships are not really too keen on being used for a test drives. Car rental companies tend to play it safe and stick to the vanilla models of what is on the “coupe” side if they even carry such but it will be paired with an automatic. Which leads me back to square one because the oohh and the ahhh with an automatic is not what I am seeking.
In my quest to find the ability to satisfy my need for speed (lets be real folks), I stumbled across car-sharing. Relay Rides is available in most cities and offers just about anything. Well, anything but a v8 with a manual transmission in Orlando it seems. I did however come across a 2002 Dodge Viper GTS. Though it may more than scratch the itch, the $449 per day price tag isn’t exactly what I was looking to spend so it didn’t make the cut. It’s not to say in other cities one may not have better luck at finding their ideal match.
Relay Rides did peak my interest as not only the idea of driving a different car every day with no obligation, an alternate method of car usage while traveling but also one could also go undercover just for fun because sometimes you just need to do that, right? Not that I am promoting the usage of any of these car-sharing companies for surveillance but simply just stating the obvious. There is also the fact with car-sharing, whether with Zipcar, Relay Rides, or GetAround, one may not even need to ever own a car if they remain flexible with the idea of any car can be available if they need it. It’s an interesting thought and apparently popular, who knew?
GfK conducted online interviews with 6,000 consumers aged 16 and over, who hold a driving license, and covering six markets (Brazil, Russia, China, Germany, UK, USA) showing that Generation Y drivers are particularly open to these. Across Germany, UK and USA, over a third (34 percent) of drivers up to 34 years old say they are likely to, or definitely would, consider using a pay-as-you-go service instead of owning a car. And the appetite is even higher in the developing markets of Brazil, Russia and China. In Brazil, 40 percent of these younger drivers make this statement, while Russia stands at 44 percent and China at 64 percent.
I personally could not relay solely on this method for transportation, however, I can see those who reside in areas where mass transit is efficient and the need to drive themselves anywhere not often do benefit.
Have you shared your car with either of these sites or rented from them? If so, we would like to hear about your experience.
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