Authors: Lorna Stevenson, University of Westminster and Sarah Royston, Anglia Ruskin University
The transition to sustainable travel within large organisations presents a unique set of challenges and opportunities. Within this, the management of staff travel, particularly parking policies, emerges as a focal area for sustainability intervention. Based on a placement with England’s National Health Service (NHS) Net Zero Travel and Transport team, this Energy SHINES policy brief explores the implications of adopting fair and sustainable travel policies, focusing on the management of staff parking, in line with the requirement to reduce private car use to meet emission goals.
The brief discusses the contextual nuances of staff travel choices and the potential of policy interventions to encourage sustainable travel modes. Through a detailed review of NHS parking policies and broader academic literature on transport practices. It underscores the need to develop comprehensive travel plans that prioritise sustainable transportation using the avoid-shift-improve hierarchy, along with the implementation of pull and push measures for alternative commuting methods. It further recommends adopting a whole-systems, justice-based approach that promotes efficient urban planning and sustainable mobility practices, and advocates for meaningful engagement of staff in the policy-making process.
This paper is an output from Energy SHINES – a project delivered through UKERC’s Whole Systems Networking Fund.
Energy SHINES was set up to facilitate partnerships between women Early Career Researchers from energy social science and humanities backgrounds and organisations in key non-energy sectors undertaking work towards net zero.
Access all publications from the project here.