ИСТИНА

Carsharing is a promising way to enable a more efficient use of vehicles. It is part of a broader technological trend called the “Sharing Economy”. Sharing Economy implies access to durable goods without a transfer of ownership, thereby potentially increasing allocative efficiency. While carsharing schemes have been operating for decades, advances in smartphone and internet platform technology have enabled technologically superior carsharing services to emerge in recent years. The most impactful new B2C carsharing service is called Free-Floating Carsharing. It allows users to make one-way trips within a city and does not require them to drop the carsharing vehicle off where they picked it up. Carsharing is a major trend and is a very relevant topic for research. Countries like Germany, Japan and the USA have all adopted it as one of the key directions for development in highly-populated metropolitan areas. Carsharing as an integral part and one of the drivers of the fourth industrial revolution helps to solve various problems: traffic congestion, climate change, social inequality, unevenness of access to resources and opportunities, traffic availability of underdeveloped urban areas and others. Russia is another country that has embraced the idea of carsharing. As of October 2019 Moscow has the largest fleet of available free-float carsharing vehicles in the world. There are over 25 carsharing operators in Russia with most of them representing small and medium-sized enterprises. Cities in Russia adopt carsharing to complement the already existent public transportation service providing carsharing operators with various benefits. The purpose of this study is to analyse the German regulatory policy towards carsharing and see if any of its features might also be implemented in Russia. Germany has been chosen as an example due to similarities between carsharing industry growth rates, urban infrastructure and city governance in Russia and Germany. There are still considerable differences in this aspect but not as drastic as, for example, between Russia and Japan. Key findings of the research: - according to several studies, station-based schemes seem to be environmentally more beneficial compared to Free-Float carsharing, which is why they should be preferred; - a new meta mobility policy is required that should include dissolution of the boundaries between pure car sharing, public transport and partly privately owned cars, since these business models seem to get more similar as new technologies expand; - parking lot fees for carsharing should be reduced or waived to encourage carsharing users and providers. That is already the case in Moscow with the city government allowing carsharing vehicles to be parked in the city centre for free (with a 90% annual rate discount for operators for each car) but the same policy should be implemented in other regions as well; - carsharing-specific drop-off points in key public areas should also be considered an appropriate measure, especially considering station-based carsharing; - linking carsharing with public transport will potentially enhance transport services in urban areas. New billing, payment and combined tariff might be considered for implementation for multi-modal city transport users; - to support car sharing directly, public finance start up-grants could be used to lower market-entry barriers due to high competition in the market; - extra vehicle taxes and city tolls will incentivize city population to use carsharing instead of buying their own cars - measures like banning specific kinds of cars may also be considered in the future. On a national level, several countries (e.g. Germany, Norway, the Netherlands, France, the UK, China or India) have made announcements indicating that they eventually will ban the production and sale of cars that run on fossil fuels List of key references 1. Best A., Hasenheit M. Car Sharing in Germany: A Case Study on the Circular Economy – 2018 2. Shaheen S., Cohen A., Jaffee M. Innovative mobility: Carsharing outlook. – 2018 3. Littmeier A. Carsharing statistic 2019: Carsharing in Germany is still on a growing path 4. Wessing T. New mobility and old laws: The modernization of Germany’s regulatory framework for mobility services – 2019 5. Woodward M. Deloitte Research: Car Sharing in Europe Business Models, National Variations and Coming Disruptions – 2019