An evaluation of primary schools and its accessibility using GIS techniques: a case study of Prayagraj district, India.

The spatial analysis of primary schools is needed to ensure that they meet standards set by the Government of India. Therefore, mapping of Prayagraj district primary schools is carried out in this research work. The spatial analysis of schools is performed using various parameters that include: literacy rate, student gender ratio, teacher taught ratio, and students' toilets ratio. Several problems were revealed in the GIS based analysis of schools by highlighting their locations on the map. The results identify the location of all those schools where there is a need to take corrective measures. Further, the route analysis between home and school is handled in this research work. Sometimes, commutation is the sole criteria in the selection of a school. Therefore, optimal path analysis has been performed based on three parameters, i.e. population density, traveling distance and traveling time. A combined weight function is also given to find the optimal path. This work will help people to select the best possible path based upon their requirements. There is often a requirement to reach all the schools to distribute the goods or other physical monitoring activities. This work gave the optimal route to visit all the schools by using the Travelling Salesman Problem (TSP). School accessibility results obtained in this research through TSP will assist in choosing the best possible route. This will help the government identify locations where new roads need to be constructed to have road connectivity.
Competing Interests: Conflict of interestThe authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
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