Angelenos can borrow a Chevy Bolt EV with the Maven car-sharing service

By Stephen Edelstein Published February 17, 2017

General Motors’ Maven “personal mobility” brand is adding the Chevrolet Bolt EV to its fleet. Members in Los Angeles can now borrow the electric car under an expansion of the car-sharing program that launched there in October.

Maven is adding 100 Bolt EVs in the Los Angeles area, and expects them to be capable of covering 250,000 all-electric miles per month once the fleet is fully deployed. The electric Chevys will be used for both car sharing and Maven’s Lyft Express Drive program, which provides low-cost weekly car rentals to Lyft drivers. GM invested $500 million in Lyft last year.

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To support the Bolt EV, Maven is working to expand the network of charging stations in the L.A. area. It plans to work with the Los Angeles Department of Water & Power and utilities on infrastructure projects. GM has no apparent plans to undertake a broader charging-infrastructure program to support the Bolt EVs it plans to sell to individuals. In the meantime, Maven Bolt EV drivers will get a limited amount of free charging at stations on the EVgo network.

Following the L.A. rollout, Maven plans to make the Bolt EV available in San Francisco and San Diego as well. It also wants to collaborate with different cities on other projects “including a fully electric autonomous network of vehicles tied to mass transportation stations.” The Bolt EV is already GM’s main testbed for autonomous driving. The automaker’s Cruise Automation subsidiary is testing the autonomous prototypes in California and Arizona, while GM itself tests in Michigan.

Launched in January 2016, Maven now operates in 17 cities in the U.S. and Canada. GM says the brand has more than 24,000 members, who have driven more than 78 million miles in shared vehicles. Car-sharing users reserve and unlock cars using an app, and pay a membership fee for access.

GM isn’t alone in trying to capitalize on sharing services. Daimler, the parent of Mercedes-Benz and Smart, has operated its Car2Go service for years, and BMW recently returned to U.S. car sharing, after a brief absence, with ReachNow. While sharing services represent a potential threat to car sales, they also represent an opportunity for automakers to attain a new source of revenue by operating said services themselves.

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Stephen Edelstein

Contributing Editor

Stephen is a freelance automotive journalist covering all things cars. He likes anything with four wheels, from classic cars…

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GMC poured all of its truck-making expertise into the Sierra EV pickup

A 2024 GMC Sierra EV towing an Airstream trailer.

The Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra pickup trucks are twins, and that will continue to be the case when they go electric.
Chevy unveiled its Silverado EV at CES 2022, and now it’s GMC’s turn. The 2024 GMC Sierra EV borrows some key features from its Chevy sibling, as well GMC’s first electric truck — the Hummer EV. Some of those features were actually pioneered by General Motors two decades ago on non-electric trucks, and are now making a comeback.
You can reserve a Sierra EV now, but deliveries aren’t scheduled to start until early calendar-year 2024. Production starts with a high-end Denali Edition 1 model, with other versions arriving for the 2025 model year.

Design
The Sierra EV updates the design language of the internal-combustion GMC Sierra for the electric age. A big grille is no longer needed for cooling, but it’s still an important styling element that designers didn’t want to break away from, Sharon Gauci, GMC executive director of global design, explained to Digital Trends and other media in an online briefing ahead of the truck’s reveal. The grille shape is now outlined in lights, with an illuminated GMC logo.
Like the Hummer EV and Silverado EV, the Sierra EV uses GM’s Ultium modular battery architecture which, among other things, means the battery pack is an integral part of the structure. So unlike most other trucks — including the rival Ford F-150 Lightning — the Sierra EV doesn’t have a separate frame. The cab and bed are one piece as well, all of which helps increase structural rigidity.
The Sierra EV also borrows the Midgate setup from the Silverado EV. First seen on the Chevy Avalanche and Cadillac Escalade EXT in the early 2000s, it allows the bulkhead and glass behind the cab to be removed, effectively extending the bed. Combined with the fold-out MultiPro tailgate from the internal-combustion Sierra, it can expand the default 5.0-foot, 11-inch bed length to 10 feet, 10 inches. A frunk (GMC calls it the “eTrunk”) provides covered storage space as well.
Because it’s pitched as a premium vehicle, the Sierra EV gets upscale interior materials like open-pore wood trim and stainless steel speaker grilles for its Bose audio system. But the design itself, with a freestanding portrait touchscreen and rectangular instrument cluster, looks suspiciously similar to the Ford Mustang Mach-E cabin. The touchscreen even has the same big volume knob as the Ford. We hope GMC’s lawyers are ready.

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GM expands recall to all Chevy Bolt EVs due to fire risk

electric car or electrified car chevy bolt

General Motors has issued a recall of its Chevy Bolt electric vehicle that expands on an earlier recall. The notice affects all 2020 to 2022 model year Chevy Bolts and all remaining 2019 models.

The recall comes in response to multiple reports of fires linked to the vehicle’s LG-made battery pack.

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A blue Chevy Bolt against a snowy backdrop.

With a range of more than 200 miles, and a base price under $40,000, the first-generation Chevrolet Bolt EV was an electric-car game-changer, but where does Chevy go from there?

For the Bolt EV’s first major update, Chevy redesigned the exterior and interior, and added a second model to the lineup. The 2022 Chevrolet Bolt EUV was meant to be a more SUV-like alternative to the standard Bolt EV, with a more upright profile and more rear-seat space. The EUV is also the first non-Cadillac model to get General Motors’ Super Cruise driver-assist system.