BlueCalifornia plugs Bollore's EV-sharing program into LA
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Angelenos, meet BlueCalifornia. Los Angeles is about to
start up an electric-vehicle sharing program operated by France-based Bollore Group. The city will become the second in the US to add such a program, according to
Hollywood Patch. BlueIndy debuted in Indianapolis last year.
The pilot program, which has been
approved by the Los Angeles City Council, will be rolled out in Los Angeles neighborhoods such as Westlake, Pico-Union, and Koreatown, as well as the area located between downtown and USC. Those neighborhoods have been deemed among the top 10 percent most in need in the state of California in terms of reducing pollution and poverty.
BlueCalifornia will include as many as 100 electric vehicles and 200 charging stations. The city hopes to attract 7,000 people to the program. Such levels of adoption would cut private-vehicle use by about 1,000, and may reduce annual greenhouse-gas emissions by more than 2,000 metric tons of CO2. The program will receive about $10 million in funding from Bollore Group, about $2 million from the city of Los Angeles, and $1.67 million in grants from the California Air Resources Board (CARB).
BlueIndy debuted in September 2015 after Bollore added about two-dozen charging spaces throughout Indianapolis, and
by this February had attracted about 1,000 members who took a collective 7,000 rides. The program uses Bollore BlueCar EVs, which aren't available elsewhere in the US. Last year, Bollore, which invested about $41 million in BlueIndy and is aiming to have as many as 500 cars there, estimated that customers for the BlueCity car's French programs typically use the cars for about 20 minutes at a time.
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