Is carpooling safe? It’s very nice to write something about carpooling. This concept is getting popular day by day as it has become need of hour for all of us to share car / van / Taxi / Auto or any four wheeler journey to meet the rising fuel price, traffic congestions and air pollution. No doubt, Govt. is working very hard to fight against traffic problem by widening roads and making flyovers but the most important two facts which we all need to understand are: - First, there is a limit to widening Roads and making flyovers and thereafter we cannot widen roads or make flyovers. Second, there is no limit to increasing vehicles. Delhi in India is getting roughly 1000 new four wheelers on road everyday and this number will increase once low cost are introduced to the market. Can we imagine traffic on roads after 1 year? Apart from increasing road capacity of handling traffic, we have to start thing about reducing traffic of the roads too. Normally vehicle's have fuel efficiency of 10 KM/L. If a vehicle runs 20,000 km/year, this means, it will consume 2000 L fuel in one year. Burning 1 L of petrol emits 2.5 kg of carbon dioxide. Thus the vehicle will emit about 5000 kg of CO2 in one year. An average mature tree can absorb about 4.5-5 kg carbon dioxide per year. Thus we need about 1000 mature trees to absorb the pollution (carbon dioxide) emitted by one car. If a single car is pooled, this could reduce four cars from the road which is equal to growing more than 4000 trees. We all do expect a lot from government in terms of reducing traffic and do something for reducing pollutions too but the question arises that do we understand our responsibilities? While driving to office in the morning, if you have look on all cars nearby your cars, you will find that each car is carrying only one passenger. If these all people understand concept of carpooling, this number of cars can be reduced to one fifth as each one which was carrying one passenger, will be carrying 5 passengers. I asked few people if they will prefer carpooling and got many different answers. Some people said they will definitely like this option. Some people said they will definitely welcome this concept if someone takes responsibility of their security. Some people said they need a good resource to find a right person to pool with may be some good carpooling website. Some people were just willing to pool with people of their own organization. Most of corporate have hundreds of employees who have cars. If these entire employees come together and decide to save environment, I am pretty sure that traffic can be drastically reduced. We have to educate people about this carpooling concept and also request companies to promote this. Promotion of this concept will be beneficial to everyone who breaths air and live on Planet Earth.
www.Poolmycar.in is India’s first corporate carpoolwebsite.
