Govt to soon launch bus service for students

SHILLONG, MAY 3: The Sustainable Transport and Efficient Mobility Society (STEMS), a society created by the government of Meghalaya, will soon launch its bus services for students of selected schools in and around the Laitumkhrah, Dhankheti area.

The aim is to address issues pertaining to urban congestion. A detailed survey and feasibility study have also been conducted before implementing the bus services on a pilot phase.

In this regard, STEMS has procured 30 GPS-enabled buses having modern features such as CCTV cameras, live location tracking, a mobile application for seat booking and payment, a bus management platform, assured seats and customer care support, STEMS chief executive office Iswanda Laloo said in a statement issued here on Wednesday

She informed that in the pilot phase, only 900 seats are available for the STEMS Bus Service. The bus routes and the selection of students for the pilot phase will be done after the registration process is completed and will be based on the demand obtained.

Laloo said the buses will be run by a dedicated operations team under STEMS consisting of trained supervisors and drivers, while, for ensuring the safety of the enrolled students, trained and child-friendly caretakers have been assigned for each bus.

Several rounds of consultations with parents, schools and local headmen have been held and various government departments are actively involved in the implementation of the project.

With the introduction of this service, it is aimed to gradually reduce the heavy reliance on private vehicles as a mode of transportation which is found to be inefficient and is one of the major causes of congestion in the capital city especially during peak hours.

The registration for seats in the STEMS Buses through the mobile application, STEMS Meghalaya is now open.

Interested parents may download the mobile application which is now live on the Google Play Store and proceed for registering their children/wards.

The manual for step-by-step registration has been upload on https://stems-meghalaya.nic.in/ for reference and will also be circulated to parents through the school authorities. The app will also shortly be available on the iOS App Store.

By Our Reporter