Our Beginning
It was a beautiful November day in 2006. The ferry ride from Woods Hole to Vineyard Haven was spectacular with flat seas and a brilliant blue sky. When we arrived in Vineyard Haven I walked across the parking lot to meet my good friend, John. The air was cold, heavy and still. All of the local taxis and shuttle buses were waiting for fares, idling to keep warm. The smell from their exhaust was overwhelming. I turned to my friend John and said, “This is ridiculous. Why aren’t all these cars hybrids? When hybrids idle the engine shuts off and there's no pollution!” The Vineyard is a pristine and beautiful place. It was (and still is) hard for me to understand why the town tolerates these polluting vehicles.
The very next week we purchased our first green vehicle (a Nissan Altima hybrid) and started THE GREEN SHUTTLE. Since then we have added several more green cars and are now providing service throughout Cape Cod as well as southeastern Massachusetts and several towns in Rhode Island, including Providence. When we started, our “green car service” was quite the novelty. No more. If imitation is the highest form of flattery, we feel quite flattered. The conversion to hybrids in car service since we started has been swift. Today I would estimate that as much as 30% of the car services are using hybrids, bio-fuel or flex fuel vehicles. Collectively we are making a difference.
Big talk is good; little deeds are better. Nothing gets done unless something gets done. We can talk about solving global warming. What if we all just do it? Since we started the Green Shuttle, we have reduced carbon emissions (as compared to a Lincoln Town Car, the car service standard) by a remarkable 100 metric tons. Just think of the possibilities. If every car service and taxi service in the country (how about the world) converted to alternative fuel vehicles, the difference would be staggering. As an example, if every car in the United States was a Prius, we could eliminate the need for all imported oil.
