Hi Richard

I suggested this a while back - it worked well when we lived in Belgium and travelled frequently to CH on holiday.

The post met with only lukewarm responses so let's see whether you have better luck.

Default meeting points work well enough and punctuality is not a problem. It's more useful for last minute participants. 

Is there a similar exisitng app / site that you'd say is a good example of what you have in mind?

In those far off days Nir when we didn't have everything that opens and shuts in the way of technology, the system was called TaxiStop [Belgian] = basically you called the centre, told them that you were either travelling to xyz and had so many places available, or that you wanted a lift to xyz. The cost [laughable] was 1 Belgian Franc per kilometer. Just goes to show you how long ago it was, prior to the introduction of the Euro. But it worked fantastically well - no problems. Even took a mother and son to CH once with their skis on my roof!

How would this be any different from blablacar and the countless other ridesharing systems?

From what I see Uber is similar to Waze except that it allows you to request services from cars nearby. Waze allows you to share your location but does not allow friends to request rides with people going to the same place. 

If I go from Nyon to Leukerbad I would tell the app my origin and my destination and it would have access to the event participation list and calendar. The app would ask me "Do you want to pick up this person from Renens or that person from Place Riponne. When I say yes the app would re-route me to that person. It would provide me with an ETA to the individual and to the final destination. The passenger would get a notification when I am within ten minutes of their location so that they wait for me at the right place. 

Theoretically the event organiser could have access to every car's ETA. 

UN organisations use fleet management software. This would be similar except that it would streamline the transport aspect of activities where cars are used. 

Blablacar look like an interesting option but they are not active in Switzerland yet. 

That is exactly the same response as I received last time, so did not take it any further

This app would be using Glocals data. It would have access to your glocals calendar, your friends' list and your "home" location. When you sign up for activities you would say "I'm a driver" or "I'm a passenger". According to this information and routing software it would see which people are along the driver's route. This would be semi-automatic. 

As a driver I have to say in the comments that I'm driving from one location and wait for people to send me queries about availablity. With app or website integration all of this would be done automatically. 

OK, I get it. 

We won't even be able to launch and maintain a service that even gets close to Uber (or its competitors). That would require crazy investments.

The best we might be able to do is make it easier for people who joined the same event to talk together online, so they can arrange lifts together. Since 90% of our events are local tho, making this feature happen would not be a high priority. That's the issue with start ups: resources (money + time) are so limited, that we have to ruthless on the priorities. 

I drive from 300-500km a weekend doing glocal activities. For people like me this would be a key feature. There are two default departure points from Lausanne so it's easier to say "meet here at this time" than create an artificial intelligence solution. I'll think of a more compelling project to work on.