Transport Oscars
St Charles’ RC Primary School, Arriva North West and Shop Direct Group’s Aintree site have scooped prestigious awards at the Merseyside Transport Awards, which took place last week (13th October) at FACT during the Merseyside Transport Conference 2009.
The awards, designed to recognise the businesses, organisations and individuals working towards a sustainable transport future for Merseyside, were presented by Jan Rowley, Liverpool City Council’s Assistant Executive Director for Environment.
St Charles’ RC Primary School picked up the TravelWise School Award for best school travel plan. Head teacher, Chris Davey, is delighted that the school has been recognised for its commitment to reducing carbon emissions and encouraging the school community to stay fit and healthy.
He said; “Pupils and parents have really embraced our Walk to School initiatives and are now embedding walking to school into their weekly routine. The recently installed cycle storage is proving very popular and more cycle training is planned. We also use public transport for school trips. We will continue with this successful scheme to encourage the children to walk to school, encourage safe pedestrian behaviour, promote a healthy lifestyle and reduce child obesity.”
Aintree-based Arriva North West was presented with the Going the Extra Mile Award for commitment to encouraging people out of their cars and onto public transport with a £28 million investment in a new fleet and a series of marketing initiatives.
Shop Direct Group scooped the TravelWise Award for its highly successful employee car share scheme, which was introduced to address parking issues following the transfer of 250 staff from its Crosby to Aintree site. Almost 120 employees have signed up to the scheme in the past six months, saving 290 car journeys a week, or 13,000 a year.
Judges were particularly impressed with the quality of this year’s entrants. Winners were chosen for their ability to demonstrate innovation and commitment in helping create and maintain a more accessible, affordable, convenient, dependable and environmentally friendly transport network for the city region.
Neil Scales, Chair of the Merseyside Transport Partnership, thanked everyone who entered the awards. He said: “I would like to congratulate everyone who took the time to enter the awards. Our vision is to provide a safe transport network, which contributes to Merseyside’s economic, social and environmental improvement and quality of life. This can only be achieved with commitment and support from people, businesses and organisations in Merseyside.”
Organisations from elsewhere in the region also recognised in the third annual Merseyside Transport Awards include:
Merseyside Fire & Rescue Service – TravelWise Organisation 2009 – for best travel plan
The National Wildflower Centre – WalkWise Award 2009 – for best walking initiative or achievement
Mersey Maritime – FreightWise Award 2009 – for improving the impact of moving goods in Merseyside
NHS Wirral – BikeWise Award 2009 - for best cycling initiative or achievement
NHS Wirral (Victoria Central Health Centre) - TravelWise Development Award 2009 - for good transport design in a new building
