The project was born from the meeting of a systems engineer, a developer and an industrial engineer who aimed to improve traffic problems in Costa Rica. As a result, they decided to implement the use of carpooling.
The team is made up of two Frenchmen and a Colombian, who arrived from France a few months ago and this transport system is frequently used in the European country.
In France there is a similar system called the ‘Bla Bla Car’ and it works perfectly. There it spread throughout Europe and that is how we move on long trips,
explained Colombian Karina Barbosa.
It is a platform that allows communication between drivers and passengers. It works in the following way: the driver makes the publication about the journey to be started, including departure time and route; at the same time, passengers look for a destination and date. They finally get the results regarding who and when they can be picked up.
Carrotico will launch its website on November 15th and it will offer a free month to users. According to Barbosa, after that month,
the website will ask for a small fee or donation to maintain it and start developing an application.
This method is very common in Europe, and it is very secure, since it doesn’t only work through recommendations between passengers and drivers, it also has a phone verification system, social networking and user ‘s bank account. There is no exchange of money. In addition, what makes it safer is to know who is the person you are traveling with.
They expect to start with two thousand users, which can register on the Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/carrotico/ or by sending an email to karina@carrotico.com
They assure that this carpooling system is a solution to reduce the great problems of traffic (less cars, less traffic jams), the difficulty of mobility from city to city, it reduces gas emissions and even more important, it is also a solution for the high maintenance and fuel costs of a car.