LA City Council greenlights EV sharing programme
A pilot programme which will place 100 electric vehicles and 200 charging stations in LA's most polluted and economically deprived areas has been authorised by the LA City Council. The car-sharing scheme will be run by BlueCalifornia, a subsidiary of French transport company Bollore Group. The programme has received $1.67m in grant funds from the California Air Resources Board and $1.82m from the City of Los Angeles, in addition to a $10m investment by BlueCalifornia. The goal of the project is to reduce pollutant emissions by introducing clean car fleets into the state's most disadvantaged communities, Mayor Eric Garcetti said.

Politics & Government Electric Car Sharing Is Coming to Hollywood The LA City Council authorized a contract for a pilot program to introduce electric car sharing across parts of the city including Hollywood Reply

LOS ANGELES, CA -- The Los Angeles City Council moved Tuesday to bring an electric car-sharing program to some disadvantaged neighborhoods.

The council authorized a contract with BlueCalifornia to operate the program, which is supported by $1.67 million in grant funds from the California Air Resources Board, a $10 million investment from the company and $1.82 million in support from the city. BlueCalifornia is a subsidiary of the French company Bollore Group, which has been operating electric car sharing in Paris since 2011 and also launched a car-share program in Indianapolis last year. The company will initially create a 100-car electric fleet and 200 charging stations as part of the contract.

"The overarching goal of this project is to also achieve co-benefit criteria pollutant emission reductions through the introduction of advanced clean car sharing fleets or other mobility options including, but not limited to, advanced technology vanpooling and shuttles into the state's most disadvantaged communities," Mayor Eric Garcetti said in a report about the pilot program addressed to the council. The program will be located in Westlake, Pico-Union, and neighborhoods north of USC, as well as portions of downtown, Hollywood, and Koreatown.

"These communities are within the top 10 percent of the highest need communities on the California EPA's CalEnviroScreen index -- a tool that was used to identify neighborhoods most impacted by pollution and poverty," Garcetti wrote. "Major portions of these communities fall in the L.A. Promise Zone, which aims to promote sustainable and livable communities where residents have access to affordable housing and diverse transportation options." The Shared-Use Mobility Center, a nonprofit organization that supports the program, said the pilot is expected to recruit a minimum of 7,000 new car- sharing users, who in turn are expected to sell or avoid purchasing 1,000 private vehicles and reduce annual greenhouse gas emissions by approximately 2,150 metric tons of CO2.