The Metropolitan Transport Corporation will soon start operating bus services exclusively for school and college-going students.
It will be modelled on the lines of the 200 Ladies Special services run by the transport corporation. Over three lakh students use MTC services every day.
Following a high-level meeting convened by Chief Secretary S. Malathi on Monday, the MTC has been given time till October 20 to prepare a detailed proposal.
Of the 600-odd routes along which MTC operates buses, 100 routes which pass through a high density of schools and colleges will be identified, a senior Transport Department official said.
A senior MTC official said that while exclusive buses along the entire route might not be possible, students leaving school in the evening could be dropped at the nearest bus terminus.
“Crowd clearance is a major problem because only four or five bus routes might pass through a particular school. During school leaving time, hundreds of students descend on the nearest bus bay. If MTC buses ply right from schools to crossover points such as Valluvar Kottam or even to the nearest railway station, in the case of Tambaram, much of the problem can be tackled,” he added.
According to him, ‘locality-specific plans' will be evolved and different strategies adopted based on the requirement.
MTC writes to schools
In order to evaluate the need, the MTC has written to all 1,740 schools including government, government-aided and self-financing schools in the city.
Of the 756 schools that have responded till now, 633 schools start functioning between 8.30 a.m. and 9 a.m.
Which means, over 80 per cent of the schools in the city open within a short time interval.
