Flexcar: My First Trip

Saturday, February 05, 2005, at 08:26PM

By Eric Richardson

I took my first trip with Flexcar tonight. Kathy and I headed out for the evening, getting some food at the Koo Koo Roo on Wilshire (by the Tar Pits), stopping to buy a pair of shoes at The Grove, and then watching A Very Long Engagement at the Laemmle Music Hall 3 farther down Wilshire in Beverly Hills. There was no particular reason for me to drive, but I figured tonight was as good of a time as any, so I walked over to the Bonaventure and picked up the car.

Once I decided tonight was going to be the night I deflowered my Flexcar membership I had to choose which car I was going to take. The reservation calendar showed four Downtown cars available: one at the Bonaventure, one at Union Station, and two at the Gateway Transit Center (really just Union Station, but the other side). The Bonaventure is about six blocks from my apartment, while Union Station is a little over a mile. A variety of buses and trains make Union Station easier to get to, but the problem there was going to be the return trip: if I dropped the car back off at 1 or 2am, how was I going to get back to my apartment? Because of this I ended up choosing the Bonaventure car.

I was a little unsure what I was doing picking the car up, but the process turned out to be really easy. After a little confusion with the valets over procedure, I ended up just walking over to the car and using my Flexcar card to unlock it. The is a pretty convenient deal: they have RFID card readers in the rear window, and you just hold your card over the reader to activate the locks. I didn't check to see if I could just hold my closed wallet up to the reader, but I wouldn't be too surprised to find that worked.

Once in the car you open the glovebox and enter your PIN number into a little keypad device. This thing's pretty cool; it's a little plastic device with a lit number pad and three indicators attached via a cord to the glovebox. You pick it up and the Enter PIN indicator is illuminated. You punch in your PIN, hit enter, and the Start Engine light comes on. And with that you're set to go.

My biggest disappointment of the night was finding that the car at the Bonaventure right now isn't a Hybrid. The website says it is, and I thought it was when I went to check it out a couple weeks ago, but it sure doesn't seem to be now. Instead it's just a normal Honda Civic. I'm going to have to check out the Union Station cars and see if those actually are Hybrids; I think I'd feel trendier in one.

Around 12:45am I drove the car back into the Bonaventure valet entrance, parked, dropped the key in the glove box, locked the car, and headed back home. Fifteen minutes later I was here and typing this.

All in all my first experience was favorable. The reservation process was simple, the car access worked great, the only downside was the disappointment vis a vis the whole hybrid thing. Or maybe it was a hybrid, just well under cover. Who knows...