Many of the founders and supporters of the first commercial carsharing company in the US - CarSharing Portland Inc. - celebrated the 20th anniversary of its launch at the Lucky Lab Brewpub on
April 2nd. Carsharing has come a long way since then.
I'll be posting a timeline of CarSharing Portland (CSP) soon and am planning a series of posts describing the founding and activities of CSP. To get notified when they appear, subscribe to this blog (link in the righthand column).
 |
| Nina DeConcini, Oregon DEQ tells a story about getting carsharing through the state bureaucracy. Others in the picture include (from left: Russell Martin, first General Manager, Jerry Zelada taking pictures, Maren Souders, Outreach and Customer Service, Dave Brook, Founder of CSP; Rex Burkholder, then with the Bicycle Transportation Alliance and co-author of the feasibility study about carsharing; Nina DeConcini, then (and now) with Oregon Dept. of Environmental Quality; Steven Scott, MetaResource Group, a co author of a bausiness planning study; Chris Hagerbaumer, Oregon Environmental Council; Francie Royce, then with the Portland Dept. of Transporation. |
 |
| Rex Burkholder and Dave Brook |
 |
| Dave, Maren Souders and Russell Martin - the CarSharing Portland crew. |
 |
| Maren, Dave & Russell. |
 |
| Nina DeConcini tells another story. Steven Scott, Francie Royce & Ed Mcnamera are also visible |
 |
| Long time carshare advocate, Steve Gutmann, shows one of the signs from the original carsharing office. |
|
|
Todd Boulanger, then with the City of Vancouver, Washington's transportation department, shows two no parking signs from the first on-street parking space reserved for carsharing vehicles.
|
Not able to attend the party but mentioned by many was Dr. Richard Katzev, Reed College psychology professor at the time, who inspired us and conducted the first independing evaluation documenting the benefits of carsharing to US cities.
 |
| Russell, Maren, Dave |
 |
| Dave getting nostalgic after a beer at the Lucky Lab brewpub. |
 |
| And a final photo of one key person from the early days of carsharing (who wasn't located before the meeting) - Clive Bullian, whose started out cleaning cars and quickly became an invaluable all around fleet person. His easy going attitude boosted everyone's spirits and got the job done. |
