Automotive

General Motors' Maven is entering Toronto’s crowded car sharing market

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  • May 26th, 2018 11:40 am
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General Motors' Maven is entering Toronto’s crowded car sharing market

Maven moves into Toronto’s crowded car sharing market
General Motors startup enters Canadian market hoping to carve out a piece of the car-sharing pie.
https://www.thestar.com/news/gta/2018/0 ... arket.html
Maven, a General Motors company already operating in the U.S. and Kitchener-Waterloo, will join the likes of Car2Go, ZipCar and Enterprise CarShare in Toronto.

Maven and its competitors allow drivers to borrow a vehicle for a few hours at a time.

“(Car sharing) really was created as an alternative to car ownership, because cars largely sit unused 98 per cent of the time when they’re owned in a private capacity — so they’re not in a fleet setting where they could get higher usage rates,” said Susan Shaheen, co-director of the University of California — Berkeley’s Transportation Sustainability Research Centre.

Ken Greenberg, former director of urban design and architecture for the City of Toronto and author of Walking Home, called car sharing “a logical and inevitable step in the evolution from where we are now to where we have to get to.”

“As we move away from the fixation with individuals owning vehicles, we’re certainly in my view, for many people, moving away from the idea that your personal identity is tied up with the kind of car you drive, notwithstanding what the auto makers would have us believe,” Greenberg said. “This is a very liberating thing.”

Maven will kick off with about 10 models, 50 cars and designated parking spaces in 14 neighbourhoods like Liberty Village, Leslieville and the Financial District. Maven cars can be used for as low as $9 an hour.
Anyone use car-sharing services?
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Car2go had sent emails threatening to pull out of Toronto if the proposed street parking pass isn't passed, it's a complicated problem
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coriolis wrote: Car2go had sent emails threatening to pull out of Toronto if the proposed street parking pass isn't passed, it's a complicated problem
car2go smart cars are always in terrible shape, filthy, always out of washer fluid, etc. I say, good riddance.
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Is Maven like zipcar or car2go? They are two totally different philosophies of car-sharing. One is hourly car-rental, the second is essentially a taxi you drive yourself.
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canoek wrote:
car2go smart cars are always in terrible shape, filthy, always out of washer fluid, etc. I say, good riddance.
canoek wrote: Is Maven like zipcar or car2go? They are two totally different philosophies of car-sharing. One is hourly car-rental, the second is essentially a taxi you drive yourself.
Yeah, a ton of Zipcars have damage, there's a Mini at the parking garage near the Skydome that has at least $9000 in damage and I see it all the time.


Maven is more like zipcar, where there are stations across the downtown core only, round trip. In the USA, they have Maven Gig which is basically Uber/Lyft, but you use vehicles provided by Maven, insurance and gas is included. Basically you go into one of their locations, pick up whatever GM (including GMC, Cadillac and Buick) vehicle you want, and use the Maven Gig app to get riders.

The fleet Maven has looks nice, obviously its new, but there are Yukons, Tahoes, Acadia's, Cadillac ATS & XT5, but also cheaper options like the Cruze, Malibu and Equinox. It looks like they even have Volts. I wonder if they'll have Camaros lol
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coriolis wrote: Car2go had sent emails threatening to pull out of Toronto if the proposed street parking pass isn't passed, it's a complicated problem
They are officially pulling out of Toronto

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