TravelSmart - Can you change two trips per week?

Most Melville residents are busy people making 24 trips per week, 20 of these by car. For many of these trips the car is the best solution (eg. carrying heavy weekly shopping, travelling to places outside of Melville or taking passengers around), but for almost half of all car trips there is a good alternative:

• Walk 500 metres to the local shop

• Take the bus to the city
• Go by cycle 1 kilometre to visit friends.

The TravelSmart challenge is to pick one or two things a week to do different – “it’s how you get there that counts”.

Currently almost 2 car trips per person per week are less than 1 km, another 8 are between 1 km and 5 km with an average trip length of 3 km. Many of these trips are quick and convenient by walking or cycling. Some longer trips are to places on a good bus route.

The City of Melville and Department for Planning and Infrastructure have been working together to offer TravelSmart to 8,000 households in the City of Melville area. The households selected for the information service are those with publicly listed telephone numbers so that they can be contacted to discuss their travel needs. TravelSmart is a travel advice and information service designed to make it easier for local residents to get around by cycling, walking or using public transport services.

The TravelSmart project for Melville follows on from a demonstration scheme in the City of South Perth. That project cut local car trips by 14% with cycling going up 61%, walking up 35% and public transport boardings up 17%. A similar project was run in the Town of Cambridge showing a 10% increase in bus use. Recent projects have just been completed in the Cities of Wanneroo and Subiaco, where results have yet to be collected.

In February 8,000 Melville households will be contacted by phone to talk about traffic and transport in the City. Around half of the residents contacted are expected to ask for the opportunity to order information on the travel alternatives available.

By March the firm coordinating TravelSmart in Melville (Social data Australia) expect to be busy delivering around 3,000 individually tailored information packs directly to residents. Many of the deliveries will be made by bicycle (with trailer) or on foot and will involve discussions on the doorstep. The information available includes pocket bus timetables, journey plans, cycling advice leaflets and information on walking for health.

For further information please contact Social Data Australia on 08 9431 1864 or contact our TravelSmart Officer, Leon Ebbelaar on 08 9364 0673 or email lebbelaar@melville.wa.gov.au