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

MAKING CAR SHARING AND CAR CLUBS WORKCASE STUDY SUMMARIESscheme. She ensures that staff members are fully aware not only of the scheme’s existencebut of its latest developments, e.g. increases in the number of car-share parking bays. Aproblem has been the imbalance between the number of users and the number of spaces.‘Politically’ the Travel Plan Co-ordinator has to wait until she has too many people using thespaces before she can put more in, as she cannot be seen to have empty car-sharingspaces. This make it frustrating for existing users, but this is helped enormously by goodcommunication: the Travel Plan Co-ordinator keeps in contact with staff very regularly.6.17 Key to success has been the support of the MEHT Board and Chief Executive. MEHT hadfirst of all to convince its Trust Board that they wanted to join. This was made a lot easierbecause of the conditions of the Planning Application, for which construction will begin inNovember 2004, to close down other sites and at least double the size of BroomfieldHospital (in staff terms). It took a little while to convince the Board but it has led to the startof significant cultural change at MEHT. The Chief Executive publicly supports the TravelPan policies at staff briefings. Car Sharing bays are also strategically placed directly outsidethe building where the Chief Executive and Chairman are located. This is a very powerfulstatement. Once the main decision–makers had been convinced it was ‘full steam ahead’.The first five car-share parking spaces were granted in February 2004 and orders have justbeen placed (September 2004) to take the number of signs up to 35, spread around the site.The Trust has made a commitment to increase the number of car-share parking sharingbays as the number of car sharers increases. The Travel Plan Co-ordinator is of the viewthat 50 bays is an appropriate target to aim for with the current site (i.e. before the plannedsite expansion).6.18 The reward system offered by Travelshare-Essex is a plus point of the scheme. Rewardsinclude discounts in restaurants and beauty salons. The reward system works through themore miles that a member car-shares using Travelshare-Essex then the more discountedproducts and services he / she is eligible for. All members of Travelshare-Essex are noweligible for major discounts on membership of the ETA (Environmental TransportAssociation). However, a weakness is that miles have to be registered with the Travelshare-Essex central office and confirmed by the people sharing in order to be eligible for rewards.MEHT is not aware of how many of its car-sharers register their miles, but suspects it iscomparatively few. However Travelshare-Essex is reviewing the process and software tomake mileage registration much simpler and when this is done MEHT will be activelypromoting the reward scheme within Broomfield.6.19 Problems of shift patterns make it difficult for some people to share, and there is a strongperception amongst staff that their shifts are unique.6.20 The car sharing scheme now works better than it did because staff area parking restrictionsare now more properly enforced. Car share spaces, and better enforcement, have movedon-site congestion away from public parking areas and therefore made it more controllable.Supporting Measures / Alternative Approaches Considered6.21 An emergency ride home scheme is offered for registered members (see above) through alocal taxi company. This is emphasised in the corporate induction, but it has not yet had tobe called on.Final V1.1, Dec. 2004 - 42 -