Waze, the navigation app owned by Google, announced today that the carpooling service it launched last year is now available in the nine counties that comprise the Bay Area, as well as Sacramento and Monterey. That means that a growing number of Californians can use Waze, an app with 75 million active users, to locate strangers to fill the empty seats in their cars on their way to work.

To be sure, what Waze is offering differs greatly from Uber and Lyft’s respective carpooling services. Drivers are paired with riders with nearly identical commutes based on home and work addresses. Waze Carpool riders are charged a maximum rate of 54 cents per mile, the current IRS reimbursement rate for business travel by car. And drivers and riders…

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