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However, why not reduce your time behind the wheel and share a ride with others? In this article, we’re looking at the many reasons to carpool. Also, we’ve found some useful apps to help you find other passengers and get started.

We’ve searched for the best reasons to carpool. Whether you’re unsure on how to get started or what the benefits are, we believe these below points will change your thinking. Let’s take a look.

One of the best reasons to carpool is that it helps you to make friends. Carpooling is a great way to meet interesting people and get to know the people you work with or go to school with. This is because there are many carpool apps available to download. As a result, you meet people who you don’t work or socialize with. Expand your circle to people you wouldn’t ordinarily meet. Depending on the conditions and size of the vehicle, you could actually meet several new friends by carpooling. Also, it’s a great way to get back in touch with people you used to go to school with or work with.

Another of the best reasons to carpool is for its beneficial factors on the environment. The United States ranked second the world for the worst energy consumption in 2010. A huge portion of transportation energy is consumed by privately owned vehicles that run on gasoline. This is essentially a non-renewable source of energy which eventually harms our environment.

Although carpooling might seem too small a step to make a difference, it will help to conserve non-renewable energy sources. This includes diesel, gasoline and more. For example, if 4 people chose to carpool, that’d save around 60 gallons a year. As a result, you can save a whole lot of fuel by carpooling, and that’s a great thing for the environment.

Also, carpooling means that less cars are on the road at one time. This leads to less pollution, carbon emission, greenhouse gas emission and other harmful factors. Consequently, carpooling is a direct step towards a cleaner and greener environment. Furthermore, with less cars on the road, that means less parking lots are needed around cities. Imagine what you could achieve with the spare land instead of having a parking lot on it. Most of our land is taken up by parking lots. However, this could easily be avoided by carpooling.

Another of our favourite reasons to carpool is to save money in a few ways. The most obvious saving is in your gas bill. By sharing an average ride with someone else, you could save around $200 a year. If you increase the number of passengers in the carpool, the savings continue to increase too. Furthermore, another way to save money is on car repairs. Daily commuting takes its toll on a car each year. With wear and tears on your brakes, clutch, and the engine, this all adds up. As a result, you are regularly saving money on the cost of labour and parts. With the rising cost of repair shops, it’s not cheap to get your car fixed when its needed.

Another way that you’ll save money is by the oil. After a while, cars begin to use more oil as they wear out. The more oil you put into your car, the more money you have to spend on your vehicle. As a result, you’ll have less to pay for and less expenses coming out of your bank. Furthermore, you’ll save money in parking fees. If you’re fortunate enough to live in an area which charges for monthly or daily parking, you can save on those fees too. Also, this saving will have a huge impact on the amount of available cash you have on hand.

From the mid 20^th century, driving has become more stressful for drivers. A study showed the health effects from driving. Research showed that drivers had higher levels of stress indicators. Also, higher heart rates, blood pressure, anxiety and more. Additional studies showed more driving correlated with more sick says and hospital attendance. Furthermore, studies have found that a daily commute can raise blood sugar, cholesterol, and depression. Not to mention drops in fitness and the quality of your sleep.

Also, the U.K. Office of National Statistics found that driving also affects our well-being. Specifically, a lower life satisfaction, a lower sense of happiness and higher anxiety are common traits of driving. Average happiness levels and anxiety rise after the first 15 minutes of a commute to work. After a 60-minute drive, these factors increase. Therefore, the longer time you spend behind a wheel, the more stressed and unhappy you become.

Another way driving increases your stress is by leader to shorter fuses. The more you drive, the less tolerance and patience you have. It’s also been found that the longer you spend driving, the lower your productivity levels at work. Employers also found more late arrivals, higher employee turnover and decreased job satisfaction. All of these factors are linked to driving.

One of the top reasons to carpool is to increase the life of your car. There are many driving habits that damage your vehicle, without you even realizing. Also, the more time you spend on the road, the more damage you’ll cause to your car. For example, resting your hand on the stick is a bad habit. This is designed to make contact with a rotating collar for a short amount of time. When you rest your hand on the gearstick, you risk applying pressure to the selector fork. As a result, this causes premature wear.

Also, many newer cars feature an indicator light to advise when you should change gear. However, not all drivers keep their eye on this light and don’t change down/up when advised. As a result, this forces your car to work in conditions it’s not prepared for. Also, this tip tends to increase economy, so if you don’t follow it, you won’t feel the financial benefits of it and end up spending more money on gas than you need to. If you travel in too low or high a gear, your engine is working harder which puts unnecessary strain of your motor. By reducing the amount of time spent driving, you’ll improve your car engine’s efficiency.

Reports found that a third of vehicle damage is caused because of potholes. Therefore, it’s important that you avoid these. However, not all are easy to spot – especially when it’s dark or wet. But by driving over one without slowing down, you can cause damage to the front and rear of your car. Obviously, spending less time in your vehicle means that you reduce the chances of damaging your vehicle.

There are more cars on the road than ever before. It makes sense to share a ride with another driver rather than doubling the number of vehicles on the road. As a result, it’ll reduce traffic jams so you can reach your destination quicker. With this, there are many other benefits. For example, you spend less time on the road and more time doing things that you love. You’ll get more time in bed and get home from work quicker than ever before. Not to mention, you’ll reduce congestion and harmful exhaust gases exposing themselves to the environment. These top reasons to carpool help make the journey easier on everyone.

SideCar prides itself on taking passengers to a similar location. This works by a passenger picking a car in the area based on the profile they’ve set. This depends on the quality of the car, rider reviews, fare, distance factors and more. Passengers can also choose their favourite driver and sort through other options. Essentially, it’s a combination of Lyft and Uber to take multiple passengers to a similar destination. This is hugely beneficial for passengers as it makes the cost cheaper too.

This is the only ridesharing driver news source where drivers price themselves, so you’ll stay competitive and get more rides. Use unique request filters to only see the rides you want to give. You’ll stay busy and make more money. Recruit riders with our driver tools and jump to the top of a rider’s list with Favorites and awesome ratings. Stay in the busiest parts of town by setting the maximum distance you want to drive to pick up and drop off your riders. Make the money you deserve by setting a base rate for your service; make even more by adjusting your price.

BlaBlaCar goes everyone and has literally thousands of destinations available with no station required. They take the time to get to know their members. All profiles and ratings are checked. IDs are properly verified. So, you know who you’re travelling with. As a result, you get peace of mind knowing that the people you’re sitting with have been verified. Another huge benefit of this app is that it’s free. That’s right. Nothing to pay. Your ride’s covered from start to finish and absolutely free of charge. This is because they partner with AXA to cover the costs of journeys.

BlaBlaCar is the world leading long-distance carpooling platform. It’s a trusted community marketplace that connects car drivers with empty seats to passengers looking for a ride, over average distances of 300km. With 60 million members in 22 countries and over 18 million travellers every quarter, BlaBlaCar is creating an entirely new, people powered, travel network. It’s making travel social, money-saving and more efficient for millions of members.

It all began in 2003 when Fred tried to get home to his family in the French countryside for Christmas. He struggled as he had no car and all the trains were full. After begging his sister to pick him up, it was on the road when Fred noticed the sheer number of people driving alone. It hit him that all those empty seats in existing cars could be the beginning of a new travel network. Over the next decade, together with co-founders Francis and Nicolas, the trio took this simple idea and built it into the world’s leading carpooling platform.

We hope you enjoyed reading the above reasons to carpool, and that this article has changed your mind. Add more time to your day and reduce your outgoings by sharing a ride with other passengers.

Do you know other reasons to carpool? Or perhaps you know some go-to apps to download and get started? If so, share your thoughts in the comments to keep this conversation going.

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