- 239,000 students use school transport, constituting 49% of total students in the emirate
App features for guardians:
- The application provides parents with the ability to monitor students’ journey and school bus trip in real-time.
- The application enables parents to directly communicate with bus supervisors and operators.
- The application is available for all government, private, and charter schools.
- The application operates on Android and iOS smart mobile phones.
Abu Dhabi: based on the major success of the initial phase of the Salama application, which included private schools and charter schools, and stemming from its organizational and supervisory role in the school transport sector in the Emirate of Abu Dhabi, the Integrated Transport Centre of the Department of Municipalities and Transport (DMT) has therefore announced the expansion of the smart “Salama” application. The application will now include all government and some nurseries in the emirate, reaching a total of 672 educational establishments that are covered by the application.
The application was developed in collaboration with the Department of Education and Knowledge and Emirates Schools Establishment, as part of a unified and integrated system for managing school transport. Through this step, the Integrated Transport Centre aims to elevate levels of students’ security and safety during their trips using school buses. At the time being, 239,000 students use the school transport service, who constitute 49% of the total students count in the emirate.
Additionally, the ITC aims to boost parents’ trust in the school transport sector by enhancing communication between them and all schools across the emirate of Abu Dhabi. In its initial phase, over 15,000 parents have downloaded the Salama app. The application presents several features to parents and guardians, such as real-time updates on the status and details of ongoing school trips, the departure time and destination of each journey, the student’s boarding and arrival times, and the ability to report a student’s absence. Moreover, it provides information on the expected arrival time at the school or home, sends notifications a certain time prior to the arrival of the bus, and offers details on the driver and supervisor, in addition to allowing direct communication with both the supervisor and operators.
The application enables the supervisor to record students time of boarding and disembarking from the bus, submit a report on status of the school trip, and add remarks to the smart system in case of emergency during the trip, which is monitored by the ITC’s control center. The application also provides detailed data that supports the process of planning, implementation, and development of strategic projects that aim to reinforce students’ safety and security, and elevate the quality of services in the school transport sector of the emirate of Abu Dhabi.
“Salama System” for School Transport
The system outputs consist of an integrated central system and smart applications available to parents, educational institutions, school transport operating entities, drivers, and bus supervisors. This enables the relevant parties in school transport to monitor students’ journeys, track school buses in real-time, and communicate instantly on the road, therefore enhancing the level of trust and confidence among students’ parents, and improving authorities’ ability to quickly respond to emergencies and accurately reach the bus’s location.
The central platform provides a mechanism to monitor and evaluate the performance of all relevant authorities in the school transport system. This is carried out through calculating the start of the journey from the time that the first student boards the school bus until the end of the trip, while taking into account traffic congestion around schools and traffic flow during peak hours.
The Integrated Transport Centre urges parents and the public to report any indiscretions committed by school bus drivers, and to contact the ITC if they have any feedback or suggestions, especially those related to safety and security, by calling the Service Support Centre of the Department of Municipalities and Transport on its toll-free number 800850.
