Montreal City Weblog

Kate 19:28 on 2019-12-18 Permalink Reply  

• Tim F 20:33 on 2019-12-18 Permalink

  Communauto FTW!

• Sean 22:32 on 2019-12-18 Permalink

  Those Smart cars were so fun to drive though…

• Bryan 23:32 on 2019-12-18 Permalink

  I was so sad to see this announcement today. I almost always found an available car2go much closer to me than a Communauto Flex car. It makes me wonder if Communauto Flex cars will become all but impossible to find after Car2go is gone.

• Dhomas 07:14 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  The signup was sooooo much easier for Car2go than it is for Communauto. I just needed to give my driver’s license and credit card and I was on my way. I started to sign up for Communauto, but it was complicated and I needed to send in insurance documents, outside of an app. I just gave up and went to Car2go instead.

• j2 09:04 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  That sucks. Car2go was a better experience even if I did get screwed digging out a car stuck on ice Christmas Day.

  Communauto feels like it was done by the STM and Opus: awkward, non-intuitive and state of the art – fifteen years ago.

• Jonathan 10:26 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  My experience with Communauto is all around positive. The process is all electronic now for signing up so long as you have a Quebec license. The file is sent automatically to them.

  I used to use Car2go, but found they really weren’t as innovative in their pricing like Communauto was. Communauto will calculate prices based on the lowest between flex rates and subscription rates (the traditional rental plans)… and they have the unlimited plan where i pay $50 a month and the first 30 minutes is free. Compared to Car2go where I had to ‘purchase’ time beforehand or risk paying a high per-minute fee (a sort of ‘calculate the higher price’ scenario which is exactly the opposite of Communautos).

  I just hope that rather than increasing Communauto prices, that this allows for a rapid expansion of the service.

• Blork 10:51 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  I used Communauto many years ago when I lived on the Plateau and needed to use a car maybe once or twice a month. I recall the signup back then was Byzantine, but once I got through it the rest worked well.

  Then a few years ago I though it would be useful to have a membership even though I live on the south shore and I own a car. The thinking is that I am usually without a car when I’m in the city, so sometimes it would be nice to be able to just grab one if I suddenly need to quickly get from point A to point B or whatever … thinking this might happen just two or three times a year, so I didn’t want anything that was expensive to sign up for.

  Wow. Communauto was mind-boggling. I all these options that all sounded the same but different, different pricing models that did not seem to make much sense, and of course the model that suited my rare use scenario was the most expensive. Then Car2Go popped up with a free signup that took no time at all. Ding! Winner.

  Turns out I only used it maybe two times in the three years I was a member, so I’m glad the signup was free!

• Daniel 12:44 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  Oof. This feels like a real blow to a lot of people, myself included. Car2go was never perfect, but it made possible some short trips that would have taken several times as long with buses or required more walking than was possible, sometimes at a price that was competitive with public transit.

  I’ve ponied up for Communauto now. I’ve never been particularly impressed with them, but it’s better than nothing and better than owning a car for us. We’ll see if they use this inflection point to grow and become more appealing, or to just circle the drain before folding as well.

• DeWolf 12:57 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  I used Car2Go more often in the past until I realized just how much cheaper Communauto Flex is. It can be almost half the price for the same trip. Car2Go’s major flaw was that it wasn’t all that much cheaper than taking a taxi, although it was a good option for getting to the airport.

  I also wonder about Vancouver, where Car2Go was quite a bit cheaper and much more abundant than in Montreal. The impact there will be pretty significant as a ton of people seemed to use the service.

• Blork 13:32 on 2019-12-19 Permalink

  An observation: I wonder if Uber cut into Car2Go use? After all, the price is about the same and you don’t have to worry about finding a place to park the car at your destination. I hadn’t even thought about that until I found myself in exactly that situation a couple of months ago in Seattle. I was in one part of town and wanted to quickly go to another part of town. Figuring out the public transit method was just too complicated since I was an out-of-towner. So I checked and there were a few Car2Go cars within a couple of blocks, so hey, but then I realized I’d have to park the car when I got to the destination (Pioneer Square) and that’s right downtown where parking is at a premium, and then my brain went *boink* and I realized we could just take an Uber, so that’s what we did. Quick, easy, app-driven. Done.

  (And BTW, for people who still don’t understand the appeal of Uber, that’s a big part of it; the app works the same way no matter what city you’re in. No downloading of apps for local taxi companies and trying to figure them out, etc. And I’m writing this as someone who generally isn’t a fan of Uber…)