Carpooling: advantages and disadvantages

In these times of crisis, it is mandatory for every user of any means of transport to reduce the cost of travel as much as possible. This applies both to students returning home to their parents with often reduced budgets and to office colleagues taking a single car to work. Sharing the same means of transport, in this case the car, has many advantages and some disadvantages are ignored. In the first part of this article, we will analyze the positive sides and then sift through the negative ones. In the first part, we would like to analyse the economic aspect of carpooling that is immediately highlighted when we talk about this type of transport. Indeed, carpooling consists of sharing the cost of the gasoline needed to travel a pre-determined route. But by opting for this type of travel there are not only financial benefits. It's true that even a small amount saved is immediately felt by each carpooler, but many people particularly appreciate another benefit, namely convenience. Non-motorised people can make a virtually non-stop trip from door to door without having to carry heavy suitcases each time, for example. Then there are the concerns for the environment. The ecological aspect is not to be underestimated in the context of promoting sustainable development. Sharing a single car is not just about sharing costs, it is also about reducing traffic and environmentally harmful gases. A single car on the road, even with 5 people on board, is obviously not as polluting as 5 cars with one driver. It also reduces traffic jams at the entrance to large cities in the afternoon. However, many people do not hesitate to criticize this way of travelling. Departure times are often put forward as a major drawback. Usually it is the car owner who sets the departure time and it becomes a fixed time for carpools to which one can only adapt. Another aspect not to be neglected is the convivial and social aspect. You can meet people you might not have seen in everyday life. During the journey with a stranger, you are expected to keep the conversation going. A kind of solidarity develops between you since you have the same goal in mind: getting to your destination. Another problem often mentioned is the impossibility of making a detour. Let's imagine that a person wants to get to point A which is 10 kilometres away, according to some testimonies, it is impossible to convince some owners to make a small detour. People travelling in the same car may have different musical tastes or prefer topics of conversation that are far removed from what really interests us. To avoid any problems related to incompatible tastes, read carefully the descriptions of the owners published on the sites offering carpooling. They contain valuable information about the owner. If there's something that doesn't suit us, it's up to us to choose whether we're going to respond to an ad accepting all the inconveniences it entails or whether we're going to keep looking elsewhere.