Renting a hybrid car in Denver

By Idelle, June 2, 2008

Well, you’d think with all the green hype in Denver that you could rent a hybrid easily. We are trying to rent a hybrid for a trip to California, but after calling numerous different rental companies, I’m finding this is no easy task. Enterprise says they have a few in their fleet, but cannot guarantee a hybrid when making a reservation – so it’s the luck of the draw. The same goes with Hertz – they do have a limited number Toyota Prius hybrids in their rental fleet, but you cannot reserve them specifically, you just have to be lucky enough that they have one when you arrive for pickup. Alamo also cannot guarantee. Avis doesn’t even have any in their fleet, their representative said that is is due to the high demand of hybrids and they are hard to order in bulk, as there are just not enough to go around.

So does anyone else know of a rental company that can guarantee a hybrid rental in the Denver area? I’m amazed that this is not available – especially with today’s gas prices. Maybe that’s why – too much demand, not enough to go around! Hopefully this will change in the near future – I expect that soon a large portion of rental fleets will be hybrids. The savings on time and money – not to mention air pollution – of renting a hybrid seems to be a no-brainer.

UPDATE: July 9, 2008
We were successful in renting a hybrid Toyota Prius through Hertz. Though, that is not to say it didn’t take 15 calls to different locations (and rental companies) to find one that had a hybrid on the lot ready for rent. But Hertz in downtown Denver (20th & Welton) did, and they even were able to “hold” it for me for a couple hours until I arrived. We drove it to California and back, and, I’d have to say, I was pleasantly surprised by the car. It went up the hills, including Floyd hill and up to Eisenhower Tunnel just fine, and that’s with a full load (3 people and a large cooler, lots of luggage). It did slow down to about 50mph coming back to Denver up Vail pass – the battery was discharged, and it seems it uses the battery for extra power to go uphill, unless it’s out of charge, in which case the gas engine takes over completely. But, Vail pass is pretty steep, and it was a full load. Overall, it had pretty good gas mileage, we hand calculated it to be around 41-43mpg from Denver to San Bernardino, California, whereas the car’s computer reported 45-46mpg. We didn’t do a lot of city driving, though, and I hear it gets better gas mileage in stop and go situations. I only had one complaint – which is that when you are backing up, along with a nice rear view camera, the car also loudly beeps at you (inside the car) until you take it out of reverse. So while I like the rearview camera, the beeping was an unnecessary annoyance. (Perhaps there is a way to switch it off?).

To wrap it up – I really liked the Prius. We only had to fill up once between Denver and California, which is enough to make me want to go out and get one (but not until our 1984 VW Cabriolet kicks the bucket – we’re not giving it up as it’s paid for, gets great gas mileage, and runs great. Plus, it’s a convertible!)