I just received a newsletter from Todd Litman of the Victoria Transportation Policy Institute that describes an innovative project that is being tested by King County Metro.
King County Metro, the Washington State Department of Transportation and other partners has $2,2 million to develop a Pay As You Drive (PAYD) Insurance Pilot project for Washington State over a 4-year period to evaluate the impacts of a pilot including at least 5000 participants. They are in the process of recruiting an insurance carrier to join in the project. The deadline for expressions of interest is February 15, 2006. For more information contact Bill Roach (bill.roach@metrokc.gov) or Bob Flor (bob.flor@metrokc.gov).
I probably wouldn’t have mentioned it, but I noticed that the Cascadia Scorecard had an article on this topic today, Pay As You Drive Insurance, and they didn’t mention this interesting program. This makes me think that the project must be really below the radar and in need of some Rain City Guide attention!
So how does it relate to Seattle real estate? Barely… But what’s important is that if you are a King County resident whose car spends almost all day at home, then you may be able to save money by joining this program and only paying insurance on the miles that you drive.
Dustin,
Thanks for posting on this. Over at Cascadia Scorecard, I actually did post on this project, but on an earlier date. Find that string here: http://cascadiascorecard.typepad.com/blog/2006/02/not_going_the_e.html
Thanks for the comment Alan,
No surprise that you’re on top of this project!
Other projects are being developed in Spain. Ecutronic Technologies, a company which originally focused in car diagnosis tools is now testing a device (Intelidrive Plus) that not only records and transmit driving data and patterns but also allows to interrogate the engine and extract parameters such as RPM, throtle position and other online engine parameters. A beta test was succesfully done with over 200 cars for an undisclosed Spanish insurance company. Some information can be seen at http://www.intelidrive.net. After partnering with SDT from Korea, Ecutronic Technologies is planning to start mass production of that device in August 2006 aiming not only to PAYD projects but also to fleet management, car clubs, traffic authorities, and car leasing companies.