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The community kitchen in Rotherhithe has been delivering a large number of prepared dishes weekly for the past two years to elderly residents and needy locals in southeast London. However, their operations face major disruption by the news that they will lose use of New Year’s Day.

This organization had relied on Zipcar, the car-sharing company that customers to access its fleet of vehicles from the street. It sent shockwaves across London when it declared it would shut down its UK operations from 1 January.

It will mean many helpers will be unable to pick up supplies from the Felix Project, that collects surplus food from supermarkets, cafes and restaurants. Other options are further away, costlier, or lack the same flexible hours.

“It’s going to be affected massively,” said Vimal Pandya, the community kitchen’s founder. “Personally me and my team are concerned by the logistical challenge we will face. A lot of people like ours will face difficulties.”

“Faced with this reality, everyone is concerned and thinking: ‘How will we continue?’”

A Significant Setback for Urban Car-Sharing

The community kitchen’s drivers are part of over 500,000 people in London registered as car club members, now potentially left without easy use to vehicles, avoiding the burden and cost of ownership. Most of those people were likely with Zipcar, which had a near-monopoly position in the city.

This shutdown, subject to consultation with employees, is a big blow to the vision that car sharing in urban areas could cut the need for owning a car. However, some experts also suggested that Zipcar’s exit need not mean the demise for the idea in Britain.

The Promise of Car Sharing

Shared vehicle use is valued by city planners and green advocates as a way of reducing the problems associated with vehicle ownership. Typically, vehicles sit as two-tonne dead weights on the side of the road for the vast majority of the time, occupying parking. They also involve large carbon emissions to produce, and people who do not own cars tend to walk, cycle and take transit more. That benefits cities – reducing congestion and pollution – and boosts public health through increased activity.

What Went Wrong?

Zipcar was founded in 2000 before being bought by the American rental giant Avis Budget in 2013. Zipcar’s UK income barely registered compared with its owner's total earnings, and a loss that reached £11.7m in 2024 gave no reason to continue.

Avis Budget has said the closure is part of a “broader transformation across our international business, where we are taking deliberate steps to streamline operations, enhance profitability”.

Zipcar’s most recent accounts said revenues had declined as drivers took less frequent, shorter trips. “These changes reflect the continuing effect of the economic squeeze, which is dampening demand for discretionary spending,” it said.

London's Unique Challenges

However, several experts noted that London has specific problems that made it difficult for the sector to succeed.

• Patchwork Policies: Across 33 boroughs, car-club operators face a mosaic of different procedures and prices that complicate operations.
• New Costs: The closure comes as electric cars start paying London’s congestion charge, adding unavoidable costs.
• Parking Permit Disparity: Residents in some boroughs pay as little as £63 for a year’s electric car parking permit. A similar shared vehicle would pay over £1,100 per year, creating a major disincentive.

“We should literally be charged one-twentieth of a resident’s permit,” said Robert Schopen of Co Wheels. “We’re taking cars off the street. We introduce cleaner models in their place.”

Lessons from Abroad

Nations in Europe offer models for London to follow. Germany enacted national car-sharing legislation in 2017, providing a unified system for parking, subsidies and exemptions. Now, the country has several shared cars per 10,000 people, while France has 2.1 and Belgium has 6.3. The UK lags behind at 0.7.

“What we see is that car sharing around the world, particularly on the continent, is growing,” said Bharath Devanathan of Invers.

He suggested authorities should start to treat car sharing as a form of mass transit, and integrate it with train and bus stations. He added that one unnamed client was looking at entering the London market: “Operators will fill this gap.”

The Future Landscape

Other players can be split into two camps:

1. Company-Owned Fleets: Which maintain their own cars. This includes Denmark’s GreenMobility, France’s Free2Move, and Germany’s Miles Mobility.
2. Peer-to-Peer Services: Which allow users to hire out their own vehicles via an app – a kind of Airbnb for cars. Examples Britain’s Hiyacar and the US’s Getaround and Turo.

Turo, a US-headquartered peer-to-peer platform, is already weighing up the UK gap. Rory Brimmer, its UK head, said there was a “big opportunity” to win more users. “There is a void that is going to need to be filled, because London still needs to move,” Brimmer said.

Yet, it could take some time for other players to establish themselves. In the meantime, more people may feel forced to buy cars, and others across London will be without a convenient option.

For the volunteers in Rotherhithe, the coming weeks will be a rush to find a solution. The delivery problem caused by Zipcar’s exit highlights the broader impact of its departure on vital services and the prospects of car-sharing in the UK.