Archive: UCSF Earth Fest Event Rolls Out Zimride

UCSF is hosting Earth Fest 2009 on Thursday, May 14, featuring vendors and representatives offering eco-friendly products, free organic tastings and information about green living.

Earth Fest is scheduled from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the Millberry Gym on the UCSF Parnassus campus. A $5 lunch will be available, and activities include drawings for prizes, such as a bicycle, and information about how to go green.

Zimride: Frequently Asked Questions

Q: Is it free?
A: Yes.
Q: I want to find a carpool; how should I get started?
A: Register for an account. Set up your profile. Post a ride. Browse matches and contact people you are interested in sharing a ride with.
Q: If I add a ride, am I obligated to take anyone who requests a ride?
A: No, absolutely not. We recommend offering a ride only to people you trust. Spend a few minutes evaluating their profile. Do they have positive feedback? Do they belong to trusted university or corporate networks? Can you look at their Facebook profile?
Q: What should I enter in the ‘starting location’ or ‘ending location’ fields?
A: Enter as much information as you can about the location. The search results will be more accurate if you include the exact address and street. Separate each piece of the address with a comma.
Q: How do you determine which listings show up in the search results?
A: Our search formula calculates the distance that you would have to drive out of your way to pick up a passenger (or vice versa), and displays the results with the best match first. The search formula is able to find people along your route even if the other person isn’t starting or ending in the same city. You can use the calendar toward the right of the search results to browse rides on future dates.
Q: Do you offer carpool systems for organizations with privacy controls?
A: Yes. Take a look at the video demo of the Cornell system, and contact Zimride for more information.

Those who bring in used sneakers will receive a free, three-day pass to UCSF fitness centers.

Among the participants in Earth Fest 2009 are:

  • Green Home Center
  • Seventh Generation
  • Eco Girl
  • Scooter Bees
  • Green Zebra
  • San Francisco Beekeepers’ Association
  • Habitat for Humanity ReStore
  • KQED Quest
  • San Francisco Department of the Environment
  • Sierra Club
  • Farm Fresh to You
  • Friends of the Urban Forest
  • Nature in the City
  • Campaign for Safe Cosmetics

On Thursday, UCSF also will introduce Zimride, the leading provider of online social rideshare- and carpool-matching systems in North America. Launched less than a year ago, Zimride now has more than 300,000 users.

All UCSF students, staff, and faculty are eligible to sign up for Zimride. There is no cost for membership.

Zimride is a simple way to find friends, classmates and co-workers who are going the same way you are. Combining social networks and a proprietary route-matching algorithm, Zimride makes it easy to share the seats in your car or catch a ride.

By focusing on college, university and corporate communities, Zimride is able to build the critical mass of users necessary to sustain a reliable form of transportation. Their approach leverages social trust and hands-on marketing efforts to deliver significant savings for schools and corporations of various sizes and commute profiles.
Members of the campus community can sign up at Zimride here.

Related Link:


Earth Fest Poster (pdf)