Comprehensive mobility dialogue and marketing campaign

Summary

Ghent is running a marketing campaign that will target the inhabitants of the CIVITAS ELAN corridor by providing individuals with one-to-one travel advice, practical support and to market sustainable travel modes.

Implementing sustainable mobility

Citizens in Ghent have access to mobility information at different locations, such as websites and information points and from various operators. The objective of this measure is to provide individuals with one-to-one travel advice, practical support and to market sustainable travel modes to target groups in order to achieve a modal shift.

The individual marketing campaign will target all the inhabitants of the CIVITAS ELAN corridor. Many other inhabitants will also receive personalised information. The final element in the marketing campaign is personalised information to help people choose sustainable modes of transport.

Sustainable travel modes are promoted by different actions:
• Distribution of a tailor-made brochure on sustainable transport modes in a particular district (Our district is moving)
• Competition between streets to find the street with the highest modal shift toward more sustainable transport modes (Our street is moving)
• Competition between GCC departments to find the department with the highest modal shift towards more sustainable transport modes (Our department is moving)
• Campaign to promote the positive image of cycling (Cycle chic)
• Personal counselling for car users willing to (temporarily) shift to a more sustainable transport mode (I keep moving, even without my car)

Progress

The scheme works by contacting people in their households and aims to quickly identify those who are likely to change their travel behaviour and then provide information and follow-up action to enable changes in travel patterns to occur.

There were some deviations:
The objective of measuring the health (weight & blood pressure) of the participants has been dropped, due to practical and budget reasons.
The competition in « Our street is moving » never took off because a lack of interest. Instead, the same concept was used for the “Our department is moving”- campaign.

Target group of car users could never be reached
The citizens belonging to the targetgroup (car users) could never be reached.  A a consequence, the actions, except of the “Our department is moving” campaign could not be started.

Not easy to reach group of people interested in personal travel advice
It was difficult to reach the suitable group of people for the “Our district is moving” campaign. Only a few people asked for personal travel advice and most of them did already move in a sustainable way others only asked for a cycle

Difficult to find candidates who want to switch from car to sustainable transport
During the preparation of the action “I keep moving, even without my car”, it was very difficult to find candidates who were willing to participate in this action. They noticed that many people do come by bus, tram or bike and are thus not suitable for this action. On the other hand, only a few car drivers were willing to use alternative modes of transport instead of their own car during some days.

Outcomes

Ghent expects the measure will:

• Increase the use of sustainable transport by 5%;
• Keep the use of private cars at the same level as in 2008;
• Improve public health by
• increasing cycling and walking.

What are the lessons learned?
 

• Evaluation method should be presented before start of campaign

A preferred evaluation method should be presented before the start of the campaigns. Moreover, not every evaluation method, e.g.MaxSUMO, can be used for every campaign or action.

• In order to change mobility behaviour, approach people in a personal way

It is not sufficient to give only general information online or on paper in order to change mobility behaviour. It is more efficient to approach citizens in a personal way or to approach them as a well-defined cohesive group. When they are approached as a group, there can be created a certain peer pressure and people can be motivated by their peers, for example by colleagues.

• Approach citizens on key moments in their life to change (mobility) habits

Citizens should be approached more on key moments in their life which cause often big changes in their (mobility) habits. Examples of these moments are moving to another place, a marriage, a divorce, getting children, change of job,…
 

• Make your message clear

The message of the campaign also has to be clear. The message of for example the Cycle Chic campaign was not clear for everyone. The more focused the message, the more people start thinking about their mobility behaviour.