January 8, 2009

By Carol McCracken

Tomorrow marks the official kickoff of the city’s new rent-a-car program. The city is partnering with U-Haul to make this service available to local drivers. The official kickoff starts at 12:15 p.m. on Commercial Street near the Maine State Pier.

Four parking spaces at two city locations have been designated to park the cars to be rented. One is on Commercial Street near the Pier. The other location is on Elm Street adjacent to the Portland Public Library. These sites were picked by the city because they connect up with public transportation systems; METRO and the Casco Bay Ferry.

The cost of gas, maintenance and insurance are included in the rental charge.

City councilor and Transportation Committee Chair Kevin Donoghue said: “Car sharing is an essential component of our public transportation system. It costs the city absolutely nothing and has the capacity to save our residents a great deal of money on transportation costs.”

Please visit www.ucarshare.com for more details.

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By Carol McCracken

It’s anticipated that in the next few weeks, Portland newspaper readers will have another newspaper to add to their daily reading frenzy reported “The Portland Forecaster” in its current issue. The daily will report Portland news as well as national and international news.

The founders of the “Portland Daily Sun” have established three similar newspapers in New Hampshire; in Conway, Berlin, and Laconia.

Founding a daily newspaper at this time is a surprising move since revenues from advertising are down dramatically; because of the general economic downturn and purportedly because more readers are turning to online news services.

According to the report in “The Portland Forecaster” the new paper will be run out of an apartment on Munjoy Hill. MHN tried to reach the paper and its Munjoy Hill office but was unable to locate a telephone number by which to do so.

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