Transport winfor council as itseeks bus cuts

East Sussex County Council was a winner in the East Sussex TravelChoice challenge, an initiative organised by sustainable transport charity Sustrans which ran throughout June.

The council is currently consulting on cuts which could see some bus services disappear altogether,

Yet ironically it came out on top in the category for organisations of more than 250 people in the online competition, which encouraged staff to log the journeys they make by bus, train, foot, bike and car share.

The challenge encouraged people to record their journeys online and receive feedback on how many calories they’d burned and how much money they’d saved by choosing to use sustainable travel.

County council staff logged 208 sustainable journeys, amounting to a total of almost 2,000 miles, in the process saving £430 and 334kg of CO2 and burning 32,761 calories.

The prize was £100 for charity, which the council chose to donate to Furniture Now, a community waste, re-use and training organisation working in Lewes, Eastbourne and Hailsham, to support access to active travel initiatives for young people

Cllr Carl Maynard, East Sussex County Council lead member for transport and environment, said: “As a council it’s important that we set a good example for using sustainable transport for everyday journeys, and the benefits that this provides for our staff in terms of being cheaper and healthier.”

In East Sussex, 44 registered businesses and 247 registered participants took part in the TravelChoice Challenge, logging 2,732 journeys amounting to 26,835 miles, saving 3,417kg of CO2 and £4,154 and burning 427,560 calories.