Google’s Waze service has gone national; Colorado commuters eligible for perks

Waze is providing the means for thousands of Colorado commuters to utilize its new paytocarpool service through the end of this month.

Waze, a popular Googleowned navigation app, celebrated the national launch of the carpool service Wednesday after two years of development. The service allows drivers willing to offer space in their vehicles to register on the standard Waze app. People seeking rides need to download a different app to be matched with a driver.

Drivers and riders can set filters in the apps to ensure they are matched with people going their way and that they feel comfortable with, even allowing them to narrow it down to people who work at the same place or attend the same school. It also handles all payments. Riders are charged a fee — which can be adjusted by the driver — for gas and other expenses. Waze moves the money.

The goal of the service, according to the company, isn’t to compete with ridehailing companies such as Lyft and Uber but to de crease commute times and lessen congestion.

“We see ridesharing as something that needs to become part of the daily commute,” Waze founder and CEO Noam Bardin told The Associated Press. “If we can’t get people out of their cars, it won’t be solving anything.”

Colorado was among 13 states that served as a testing ground for the beta version of the service last month. Through the end of October, the company will reward the state with subsidized rides. Any Coloradan who downloads the new app by Oct. 31 will be provided with $2 flatfee rides through the end of the month. Waze has estimated that most rides will cost about as much as taking public transportation.

The deal gets better for employees of 56 metroarea companies participating in the Denver Regional Council of Governments’ — or DRCOG’s — GoTober Challenge this year. Any of the roughly 60,000 workers represented at those companies ride for free if they use the service in October. Participating businesses include DaVita and Western Union.

“We’ve been doing carpooling for 40 years now,” said DRCOG spokeswoman Winna MacLaren. “In the traditional carpool model, we go out to employers and do lunchandlearn sessions and get everyone in a room and see if we can find people we can match for carpooling. The beauty of Waze is it is on demand.”

DRCOG has registered around 240 active carpools in the metro area through its My Way to Go program, MacLaren said. They combine to take an estimated 880,000 vehicle miles driven each year off the roads. With the Denver area’s population expected to hit 3.4 million people by 2040, a total that could see the average commuter’s time in traffic rise to 104 hours per year from 66 hours, the agency is eager to find more ways to get people into alternate modes of transportation.

MacLaren said offering free Waze carpool rides to GoTober participants for free serves two purposes: It makes the service less intimidating to new users, and gets employers on board. DRCOG has found that people are more willing to try new commuting options if those options are backed by their employers.

Waze does not charge a commission for the app’s money transfers. Google makes gobs of money selling digital ads on Waze and its many other services. But Gartner analyst Mike Ramsey warns that might not always be the case.

“I do think Google is realizing that it can’t just keep making all its money from selling ads,” he told The Associated Press.