Lyft opens Phoenix service center for car, driver certifications
Lyft opened a service center for its thousands of Arizona drivers on Thursday, offering a facility where they can get themselves and their vehicles certified to drive for the ride-sharing company.
The 3,800-square-foot facility in an office park south of Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport has about a dozen employees now and will have about 20 by year-end, said Drena Kusari, Lyft Southwest region general manager.
They help would-be drivers get signed up to pick up riders through the Lyft network. The center also serves as a break room for drivers.
“This fosters the sense of community that sets Lyft apart as a company,” Kusari said at the opening ceremony.
She said the company had a $40 million economic benefit to the regional economy last year by promoting travel through its services.
To calculate the economic benefit, Lyft surveyed more than 38,000 passengers and 15,000 drivers in 20 major cities. The analysis was conducted by Bill Lee and Tanya Chiranakhon from the Land Econ Group.
The analysis calculated the average amount of time saved by using Lyft compared with the next most convenient travel option. Travel time was calculated to be worth half the average hourly wage in each metro area.
The figure includes trips passengers took to retail facilities that they otherwise would not have taken in the past because of the drive or poor parking, she said. “It’s a network effect,” she said. The company has similar centers in San Francisco, Seattle; Los Angeles; Las Vegas; Washington, D.C.; Boston; and New York. A center in Atlanta also opened Thursday.
Arizona requires ride-share compa- nies to inspect a vehicle in person, so a 19-point inspection is part of the “onboarding” procedure would-be drivers must complete to work for Lyft in Arizona.
Drivers also can just relax, get training or have a soda in the lounge at the facility.
Phoenix Mayor Greg Stanton said the city is happy to partner with Lyft, which he said fills a niche in regional transportation.
“We need as many transportation options for the people of the city of Phoenix as possible,” Stanton said. “Public transportation doesn’t reach every Phoenix neighborhood, but Lyft does.”
He said company research shows a quarter of Lyft passengers in Phoenix use the service to get to and from public transportation that doesn’t reach all the way to their destination.
“It is a value-add to our transportation system,” Stanton said.
Uber, a ride-sharing competitor of Lyft, opened a similar facility in Phoenix in 2015, though that facility included additional support jobs in technology.