'Tinder for footpaths': Bengaluru teen builds app to tackle city's traffic, pothole issues

A teenager from Bengaluru developed an application that could potentially revolutionise traffic congestion and pedestrian movement, in what he describes as a 'tinder for footpaths'.

As the city continues to tackle traffic-related concerns, including potholes, construction on roads, and broken or missing footpaths for pedestrians, technology like this aims to raise urgent issues to authorities for immediate action.

In a post on social media platform X, Surya Uthkarsha shared a video showing how he created the app from square one, in just 30 minutes. Naming the application 'RASTHE: Tinder for Footpaths', he said this aims to fix the city's infamous traffic and Bengaluru as a whole.

Surya wrote that this could "turn every citizen into a sensor for the city", as it functions in the same style as the dating platform Tinder, and the app would be a crowdsourced platform.

He elaborated the features expected of the app saying, "Report broken / missing footpaths directly to BBMP, swipe footpaths like Tinder, upvote the worst spots that need urgent fixing, turn every citizen into a sensor for the city."

"If roads are built for cars, this is built for people. Prevents pedestrians from walking on roads reducing congestion," he stated in the caption.

Though the initiative seemed solid, netizens showed mixed reactions. A user commented, "Will BBMP engineers fix issues only after they are raised here? They already have a platform called Sahaaya, but pothole and footpath complaints there are rarely resolved."

"People are just building apps, who is going to fix the issues raised? I have seen a dozen till date nothing has made an impact. Please stop creating more unnecessary apps," another comment read.

Though many users emphasised that action is more needed than an app re-created for a similar purpose as one in the past, others applauded the initiative.

"Amazing work.. by the way. Bengaluru really needed this!," a user wrote.

A user replied, "Amazing. It'll help a lot of people," echoing the sentiment.

RASTHE was built using the application '10x' in 30 minutes, and is ready for submission to be launched officially.