The days of unkempt and often unwashed looking reprobates standing at the entrance to a motorway holding a home-made sign with a destination such as "London," or more intriguingly "Junction 8 on M6" (what did these people do there?) seem long gone.

Few will mourn their passing, yet there are some 38 million empty seats in our cars every day of the week.

Sharing a lift with a work colleague is an idea that has been around for a long time, although in reality few stick at it very long as people become very territorial.

Many lift-sharing arrangements break down after a short while because of people's bad habits, music tastes or after-work commitments. Yet despite this, the average car-sharer could save £1,100 per year in travel costs by sharing the cost of the journey.

Car sharing is now a more organised activity through Liftshare.com, which now has more than 265,000 members on its free to register website.

This database now means that it is no longer necessary to rely on finding your own lift (or passenger) in order to make a car-sharing arrangement.

It is also possible to find out if you can arrange or offer a one-off trip to somewhere further afield.

The number of people signed up to the database is still fairly small compared with the number of motorists overall, but with the increases in petrol prices this year, coupled with more awareness-raising activities, large numbers have signed up this year.

If people who have already signed up report positive experiences, the success of this initiative is likely to develop even further.

For further information about the scheme, visit www.liftshare.org.

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