Public transport

I car pool with my colleague every day. It gives me great satisfaction to know that I am helping to save the world in a tiny little way. However, I know that I could save the world to a slightly greater degree if I took public transport. The reason I do not do so is that the only train station near my place is a KTM, and as we all know, KTM is synonymous with turtle.

Other forms of trains are more acceptable, as they move much faster and are more comfortable. The only trouble is they tend to become very jammed at times. Buses are out for me because I usually have to stand for a long time in the jam and my laptop is very heavy. I wish there was a better mode of sharing transport.

What I really really wish was that say every car could put up a sign on their roof saying which way they were going. Then I could hop in and pay them a bit of money and go the same way. They wouldn't need to charge me as much as a taxi because they are going that way anyway, so the marginal cost is very low for them. In fact, the more I think of this the more it seems a good idea. So many cars going in the same way with only one person inside really makes the tree-hugger inside me weep silently. Of course, this might not be feasible in our society due to everyone being scared of getting robbed, but in a more safe and cohesive society it might work. Maybe Japan... but their trains are too damn good.

I have thought about this issue for a long time. In my opinion, there is only one way to handle the safety issue: make a new application on Facebook called "Carpool". So once you get on somebody's car, you have to check in to his car, then everyone knows who and who are together. If anyone robs anyone, we know who did it! People could also discuss average reasonable prices for different distances and routes on this application.

Now you may ask me what happens if someone doesn't have the application. The answer is then he or she can't carpool in this manner.

I really think this is a wonderful idea. Mark Zuckerburg should call me to discuss this proposition. After all, it can't be worse than that application which was supposed to notify you when someone in your friend list broke up, right?