Lyft pulls ‘carpool commute’ option

Just 5 months after announcing it, Lyft is pulling its ‘Carpool Commute’ option in San Francisco.

Uber-rival Lyft announced the move into shared trips back in March, where customers could earn up to $10 per ride by picking up others heading in the same direction. However, the feature appears to have not been as popular as expected, and it is being shut down already. The team responsible for the development, launch, and maintenance of the product will be moved into other roles within the business.

A Lyft spokesperson confirmed this to the press, saying “While we think a scheduled carpool feature is the right long-term strategy, it is too soon to scale to a meaningful level where supply matches demand. We learned a lot and will apply it to new and existing projects — like Lyft Line — as we drive our vision forward to solve pain points in commuting”.

When Carpool Commute was launched, it was hoped to attain some of the commuting market, which until now has primarily remained out of the reach of ridesharing providers. Lyft’s own statistics showed that those in the San Francisco Bay area spent 75 hours a year stuck in traffic and 76% of those commuters drove alone!

More informal liftsharing companies already exist in the area, and continue to thrive amongst the market, but ridesharing services like Uber and Lyft seem to struggle to capitalise on the traffic.

Would you share a taxi to work rather than liftsharing? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below, or on Twitter!

Photo credit: Wikimedia