Making Car Sharing and Car Clubs Work - Case ... - The Civil Service

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MAKING CAR SHARING AND CAR CLUBS WORKCASE STUDY SUMMARIES6.7 Travelshare-Essex is a closed-group, web-based, fully automated journey matching service,free for individuals to join, and free to use, and is intended mostly for employees ofregistered companies, although individuals unconnected with an organisation can join.Once registered, it provides the member with details of other members making similarjourneys to his / her own. It is a joint project of Essex County Council and the ChelmsfordEnvironment Partnership (CEP) and was conceived about three years ago. Funding wasobtained from both Essex County Council and Chelmsford Borough Council as well as theCountryside Agency. This enabled the appointment of a co-ordinator to link up with localorganisations which might become part of the scheme. Starting up as a scheme coveringChelmsford only, it was expanded, with the support of the County Council, to cover thewhole of Essex during 2003. 19 organisations have now been recruited to join the scheme,but the largest partner is MEHT. Although MEHT was always recognised as a key target ofthe scheme it was one of the later organisations to join because the process of approvingand defining its Green Travel Plan was fairly lengthy. A steering group, comprising severalof the partner organisations, oversees the Travelshare-Essex scheme. Annual fees arecharged to organisations for their use of the Travelshare-Essex car-sharing scheme, with thebusiness plan being that these fees will in time cover all costs so that the scheme can thenexist without public financial support.6.8 A specific feature of Travelshare-Essex is the variety of incentives it offers to members as areward for car-sharing: it sees incentives as an integral part of any successful car-sharingscheme. It also provides a detailed set of guidelines to its members on using car-sharingsafely. MEHT guarantees its registered and active car-sharers a ride home in the event ofan emergency and, on its Broomfield site, a chance to park in a marked, priority car sharespace. The guaranteed ride home is a condition of corporate membership of Travelshare-Essex but is restricted to those who miss their ride home through what could be classed asan emergency. The Travelshare-Essex website also has an impact indicator showing howmuch a member can save by car-sharing and gives simple guidance on the insuranceposition of car-sharing and on what are legally acceptable charging arrangements. It alsoexplains what is done with personal information that users provide to it. Travelshare-Essexalso provides a series of annual awards, in association with local media, to ensure that localbusinesses and organisations get the recognition they deserve for the successfulimplementation and integration of Travelshare-Essex car sharing. These awards are givenout to the organisation with the most innovative incentive schemes for its staff, to theindividual who has collected the most Travelshare-Essex miles and also to the organisationwith the highest ratio of Travelshare-Essex Miles per member of staff. The software isbespoke, and designed by Oxford Computer Products Ltd. CEP went out to tender forcompanies that could provide GPS, although in the event a GPS system was not actuallyimplemented.6.9 Key motivations for CEP setting up Travelshare-Essex were environmental, congestionreductionin Chelmsford, and the enhancement of accessibility, particularly in rural areas.However, these were not specifically objectives of MEHT in joining Travelshare-Essex, andin fact the Travelshare-Essex scheme is an interesting example of organisations withdifferent objectives and interests partnering closely to deliver an effective car-sharingscheme. The MEHT group on Travelshare-Essex is a closed group, covering MEHT sitesother than Broomfield, but not including individuals or organisations outside MEHT.Final V1.1, Dec. 2004 - 40 -
MAKING CAR SHARING AND CAR CLUBS WORKCASE STUDY SUMMARIESOperation of the MEHT group is done by the Travel Plan Co-ordinator and Travelshare-Essex’s co-ordinator. MEHT’s membership of Travelshare-Essex costs £1,000 per year.6.10 Provision of minimal personal information was an important factor in designing theTravelshare-Essex scheme. Names, postcodes and some personal preferences were theonly things saved on the system. Teresa Prosser will show interested staff about how to usethe system in practise, and staff are often surprised about how little personal information isrequired, though staff can input their journey pattern into the Travelshare-Essex website.6.11 Car-share permits are needed for the individual passenger, so a car-share car parked in acar-share parking bay will display a minimum of two permits. All staff pay for car parking, butthis is currently a nominal fee, and less than what visitors pay.6.12 Car sharing across functional and departmental boundaries / barriers does occur to a certainextent. In administrative and medical areas, and where shift patterns allow, people do crossover these boundaries. Outside these areas (e.g. domestics and porters) people tend not toshare across boundaries. However, this will also be due to shift patterns and to the fact thatthese people generally have less interest in looking at the scheme on the internet. They findout about the scheme by word of mouth, and then, with their car-share partner, they tend toapproach the Travel Plan Co-ordinator and get permits.6.13 Broomfield has, in general, no reason to open the scheme up to non-employees but it doesallow visiting social workers employed by Essex County Council, which is also a member ofTravelshare-Essex, to apply for a permit if they car-share.Impact and Effectiveness6.14 Of the 130 registered members of the Broomfield scheme, 115 members have ‘found’matches and have been issued with permits. MEHT believes that around 50% of these havestarted to car share since the introduction of the scheme. About 85 of these members usethe scheme regularly. The current breakdown of the Broomfield car-sharing membership is77:23 Female to Male, but a breakdown by age is not available.6.15 The ‘before’ travel survey found that over 78% of trips to and from work were made by car,(71% being single-occupancy and 7% car-sharing), whilst cycling accounted for 1.7%,walking for 3.3% and bus a little over 10%. The remaining 6.23% consisted of staffmembers being dropped off by partners or friends, and those coming by motorcycle. Thecurrent mode split of trips is as yet unknown. MEHT have not looked into how much moneypeople save through car-sharing, but they do know that the majority of their sharers aregroups of three rather than of just two. However, because of shift patterns these groups ofthree may only ever travel in groups of two at a time. There is at least one group of four.Successes / Failures6.16 MEHT had to appoint a Travel Plan Co-ordinator as part of the Planning Agreement for theexpansion of Broomfield Hospital, but although they were not required to appoint one untillater, they decided to do this early, from summer 2003. The person appointed to the TravelPlan Co-ordinator post, Teresa Prosser, is a highly visible and proactive advocate of theFinal V1.1, Dec. 2004 - 41 -
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