Ballygunge: Seventy-odd parents turned up for a car-pooling app demonstration at Modern High School for Girls on Saturday morning - a good omen, according to cops, for the city's traffic situation.
Traffic snarls near schools - the worst being around the La Martiniere Schools, followed by Modern High and St. James' School - are a major problem.
"Traffic is affected because of the large number of vehicles that converge at one point around the same time. If more people share vehicles, it would take pressure off the traffic," said V. Solomon Nesakumar, deputy commissioner, traffic.
Modern High had invited parents to brief them about a car-pooling app called "Ecosmart Pool". "We are working with this organisation (that has created Ecosmart Pool) to develop an app, which parents can use to locate other students in the neighbourhood," said Nesakumar. "Parents can take turns to ferry kids to and from school. We hope to start this at the earliest."
Calcutta police had approached several schools to try out options such as school buses, app cabs and owner- driven car pools to reduce the volume of traffic on the road. But all the proposals had been turned down.
Modern High, however, has taken a pro-active step by requesting parents to use the app and pool cars.
"We want to make some kind of an inroad into this. As citizens, we have to do something rather than just wait for the government to pass laws. Even if it's one car less, it matters," said Devi Kar, the director of the school.
The school has assured support in the form of parent volunteers who would help children cross the road.
A mother who drives her daughter from Salt Lake to the school on Syed Amir Ali Avenue everyday welcomed the app. "I know there is another child in the next block who travels at the same time. I would be eager to use such an app so that we parents can alternate on days and drop and pick up kids," said Debanjana Chatterjee whose daughter is in nursery.
Principal Damayanti Mukherjee said if the model is adopted "it would have a ripple effect."
