Duration: 1 July 2003 to 31 October 2004

Conducted in co-operation with Prof. Dr Thorsten Raabe, University of Oldenburg, Chair of Sales and Marketing

Funded by the German Federal Environmental Foundation

Road transport is one of the main sources of environmental pollution in modern industrialised society. This also applies to commuting to a large public educational institution such as the University of Oldenburg - especially in the case of a rural catchment area.

One way to reduce the environmental impact is to form car pools. Modelling studies have shown that currently only a relatively small proportion of around 5% of members of the University of Oldenburg make use of this option. We believe that the reasons for this rather low utilisation of this option include a lack of information about possible carpooling options and problems in communicating with potential carpoolers. The use of current media technologies such as communication platforms on the Internet can help to reduce information deficits and at the same time facilitate communication between car users who are willing to take environmentally friendly action and increase their efficiency.

In this project, a model test was carried out to investigate the introduction of such a system in terms of its effect on the behaviour of potential users, members of the University of Oldenburg, and to determine reasons for acceptance/non-acceptance and further wishes for such a communication platform. To this end, a trial run of the prototype of the ORISS Internet platform for arranging car pools at the University of Oldenburg was carried out. In the course of this trial operation, the system, which had already been in place due to student work, was adapted to further user requirements and stabilised.

The results of the pilot project are, on the one hand, a further user-optimised software system for Internet-based carpooling, which will be operated by the University of Oldenburg in a follow-up project. In addition, the practical experience and the results of the acceptance study were made available to other potential users of such a system at universities through publications and as part of a workshop.

The final report of the project can be found here.

Discontinuation of the carpooling system

On 10 June 2008, we had to discontinue the operation of the CarPooling platform for financial and personnel reasons. We were very happy to make this platform available to you and hope that you have been able to benefit from it, even if not every offer or request could be successfully arranged.

Of course, we hope that you are still interested in carpooling. We have therefore looked at various open carpooling systems and found two internet exchanges that are interesting for our region: drive2day and Mitfahrzentrale.
We would also like to point out the carpooling service on the Stud.IP notice board.

Of course, there are also other offers.

Best regards,

Your CarPooling team