I had missed this NYT article about the growth of sharing programs in the US, which focuses mostly on Zipcar. I don't have any strong opinions about whether non-profit or for-profit systems are the way to go, though I do think the article downplays the primary advantage of succesful carsharing programs. Reducing driving is a good thing from various perspectives, but so is reducing car ownership in urban environments. Reducing the need to own an automobile can save households money, and simply taking cars off the street is a way to improve urban living. Cars take up space, in a bad way. Already some new developments are being allowed to reduce overall parking requirements in exchange for adding a couple of reserved spots for car sharing cars.
An immense amount of an urban area is handed over to cars. Reducing that just a bit is, to me, a great success of car sharing programs. The fact that non-profits are a bit more interested in having people drive less than are for-profits doesn't really concern me.
