Transport
WHAT WE ALREADY DO
Recognise that travel to work and to attend events is the biggest carbon generator for the business. We are now calculating employee, participant, contractor and volunteer travel mileage and inputting this data into our annual carbon audit.
Provide bus transport to support the inbound travel of participants at the Dragon’s Back Race® and bus transport to return participants to their vehicles at the end of the Dragon’s Back Race® and Cape Wrath Ultra®.
Allow flexible working so employees can work from home to minimise routine journeys into the Ourea Events office.
Provide shower facilities at the office which ensures employees who cycle into work can be comfortable and clean when arriving at the office.
Bundle together our site meetings with venues and landowners whilst combining course planning and production visits into one trip so that we minimise work related travel.
Work with SI Entries to build a carbon calculator into the entry system so that we support participants to off-set their travel (part of tree planting program).
Actively promote and incentivise lift sharing, use of public transport and greener modes of transport to all participants attending our events.
Clearly describe how participants can use public transport to attend our events.
Offer a park & ride scheme at Skyline Scotland to encourage customers to travel to Scotland via public transport
WHAT WE ARE PLEDGING TO DO
Incorporate transport hubs into events such as Great Lakeland 3 Day
Review event packing lists ensuring vehicle hire is streamlined to reduce event travel emissions as much as possible
Above: The event convoy at the 2019 Dragon's Back Race® - reducing the carbon footprint of the transport associated with our events is going to be our biggest challenge ©No Limits Photography
If you want to take part in an event, some travel is inevitable. We know from our 2020 carbon accounting that travel to work by employees, and travel to Marmot Dark Mountains™ (our one event of 2020 delivered in January) accounts for the vast majority of our carbon footprint.
We now have a system in place to estimate the travel footprint of our participants, contractors and volunteers to our events. This includes our employees daily travel to work. This could be better, and we will be working with SI Entries (who provide our online entry interface) to build a carbon calculator into the entry system so that each participant can see the carbon cost of their journey.
Reducing the carbon footprint of the transport associated with our events is going to be our biggest challenge. Not least because of the remote nature of our events, highly dispersed customers, and poor public transport infrastructure.
To make a significant dent we will need to actively promote and incentivise lift sharing, use of public transport and greener modes of transport to all participants attending our events. At the same time as minimising vehicle use associated with the production and delivery of each event. It’s a big challenge and we are aware that we don’t have all the answers yet.
Did you know?
This area of focus is part of our progression towards goal 3 of the Outdoor Friendly Pledge