CHUMS - Changing Habits for Urban Mobility Solutions

Challenge

To create behavioural change for sustainable urban transport, with a focus on encouraging carpooling.

Solution

The CHUMS behaviour change strategy focused on carpooling. It included a carpool week, personalised travel plans which included carpooling options, and a mobility jackpot lottery to attract people to carpool.

These initiatives had all been shown to produce significant behavioural changes when implemented, increasing car occupancy, reducing car numbers and reducing energy use, which were the strategic aims of this project.

The approach was tested and validated in five ‘champion’ cites that represented the scale of carpooling and the diversity of mobility mind-sets across Europe: Craiova (RO), Edinburgh (UK), Leuven (B), Toulouse (F) and Perugia (IT). They all had existing car-pooling systems, at various stages of maturity, serving ‘closed’ target groups such as workplaces or universities.

Impact

Thanks to the establishment of a European carpooling ‘interest group’ early on, with members from 19 member states and candidate countries, there was further take-up of the CHUMS measures during the project.

Takeaways

Results showed that successful sites had a critical mass of potential carpoolers of 2000 employees as a minimum, with a notable positive incentive being a ‘guaranteed ride home’ if a carpool buddy was unavailable. Poorer performing sites tended to be those with excessive free parking. Carpool weeks and prize draws were generally more effective (and cheaper) than PTPs. Younger people were most open to carpooling.