Two months after General Motors announced a $500 million investment in transportation startup Lyft to work on autonomous cars, the pair are launching their first service together. No, it’s not a self-driving car fleet (yet); it’s a short-term rental program called Express Drive: GM will provide all-in rental cars to Lyft drivers, who will pay between $99/week plus mileage and nothing at all, depending on how many Lyft rides they provide using the vehicles.
Going live first in Chicago with 500 vehicles, all of a single model — the Chevy Equinox — Express Drive will then roll out to three more cities — Boston, Washington, DC and Baltimore — before expanding elsewhere (and potentially to other car models).
Lyft and GM believe that Express Drive will help the pair lay the infrastructure for fleets of self-driving cars down the road. But one of the more immediate aims of Express Drive is simply to put more Lyft vehicles on the streets today.
