We were delighted to exhibit at the Engineering Fair 2022 in Atlantic Tecnological University (IT Sligo) on the 6th of March and to introduce everyone to the CoMotion ebike.
Thanks to Oli Melia and all at the engineering department for inviting us and a massive well done for holding such a wonderful event.
Pictured is the Jarlath Gantly, Managing Director of CoMotion talking to Ocean Fm’s Austin O’Callaghan.
CoMotion were delighted to introduce our new Electric Bike Share Scheme to Eamon Ryan TD Minister for Environment, Climate, Communications and Transport at the new FMCI Facility. The Shannon bike-share scheme will launch this spring with the support of Clare County Council and Shannon Commercial Properties.
Present at the announcement were (L-R) Cllr. Donna McGettigan, Cllr. John Crowe Cathaoirleach of Shannon Municipal District, Cllr. P.J.Ryan Cathaoirleach of Clare County Council, Eamon Ryan TD, Jarlath Gantly CEO CoMotion, Emma Dobbyn Sales & Marketing Director CoMotion, Terry Gallagher Operations Director CoMotion, Senator Róisín Garvey, Liam Conneally Director of Economic Development
Shannon Municipal District and Gerry Dillon Group Property Director Shannon Commercial Properties.
#shannonchamberofcommerce #shannongroupplc #SharedMobility #CommunitiesInMotion #CompaniesInMotion #Shannon #ShannonCommunityGroup #FutureMobility #share #environment
In the past number of weeks, we have seen numerous reports regarding our climate and how the deadline for change is becoming increasingly close to expiring. We are all aware of the negative impact our travel choices are having on the environment, but what can we do about it?
It was recently announced that Dublin City Council are creating a team to explore shared mobility and “mobility hubs” for communities and the general public. This is a huge leap in the right direction as we are now seeing councils considering the travel needs of their citizens and investing in services to meet these needs.
Owning a car does not just cost you the price of the car, there’s tax, insurance, NCT, fuel, parking charges, just to name a few. There are also the non-financial factors we don’t consider like the cost of our time sitting in traffic, pollution, and congestion. All of these factors impact our personal lives and the wider community. The average car spends 95% of its life span parked up, which means we pay for our cars to sit in driveways or car parks for 159 hours a week or 8,322 out of 8,760 hours per year.
So, the question is, “does personal car ownership make financial sense?”
For people in rural communities where bus stops are 5km apart, personal vehicle ownership is a necessity as walking to and from a bus stop in the depths of winter in Ireland on roads that are poorly lit is a health and safety issue.
However, for people living in cities or towns, who just use their car once a week to do “the big shop” or the odd trip to IKEA, the cost of running a car (according to the AA approx. €10,691 per annum) is an unnecessary expense which adds to their already increasing living costs.
The pandemic has also proven that people can work effectively from home and do not need to be in the office 5 days a week. For the majority of us our commute to and from work is when we will spend the most hours in our cars. But, if more companies adapted a remote working policy, suddenly those daily commutes could become weekly or biweekly commutes and the need for personal cars becomes redundant and the use of a shared vehicle becomes a far more viable option.
Shared mobility needs the engagement from aspects of society to participate for it to be a success. For instance, if you use your car to commute to work 2 days a week, but your company provided you with access to a shared vehicle for those 2 days, your personal car now becomes a luxury that you may not need. If your local council provided a share vehicle for you to transport your groceries from the supermarket, suddenly you don’t need your personal car for that journey either.
A poll recently carried out by TheJournal.ie discovered that majority of its readers do not feel comfortable using public transport due to the looming presence of Covid-19. For those people, shared mobility may be their best solution as it can be multi modal e.g. bikes, cars, ebikes.
Shared mobility is multi-generational, it can help combat social exclusion in all walks of life and open the doors for people who cannot afford a personal car and get them on the road to success. However, its success lies in the hands of the general public who need to shift their mindset and realise the implications our transport decisions are having on the environment and the knock-on effect they will have for future generations.
Is the move to towards shared mobility and away from personal vehicle ownership going to solve world hunger? No, it’s won’t. However, will it drastically alter the way we travel and our impacts on the environment? Yes, it will, but it will need to be encouraged by all members of society.
Increasingly more marketing campaigns are focusing on sustainability. However, with a greater emphasis on sustainability and “going green” we are seeing more examples of greenwashing.
Greenwashing is providing misleading information about how a company’s products or activities are more environmentally sound then they actually are and inflating their green credentials in the process. Greenwashing is now deemed as unethical, even though it origins date back to the 1980’s.
Greenwashing in the transport industry undermines global biodiversity plans as well has endangering natural habitats and communities. Transport is responsible for a large share of the EU’s greenhouse gas emissions and a major contributor to climate change, as it consumes one third of all energy, most of which comes from oil.
So how do we combat it?
The answer is simple; we must invest in more sustainable and ethical modes of transport that have the research and evidence to back them up. By encouraging the use of pool or shared vehicles over personal vehicles the average person can reduce their annual mobility emissions by 33-67%.
Below are a few tips for spotting greenwashing:
All in all, a company’s environmental decisions cannot just be based on a cost benefit analysis, but instead should redesign their procedures and implement more sustainable and environmentally processes.
Source: EEA. European Envirnomental Agency . 2021. https://www.eea.europa.eu/themes/transport/intro
According to Lonely Planet “history is everywhere” in Ireland so it’s no wonder that pre-pandemic, travel and tourism were estimated to have contributed €17.9 billion to the country’s GDP. A survey recently carried out on the “Intention to Use Shared Mobility Services”, discovered that leisure and tourism were the sectors that used shared mobility the most.
For countries like Ireland, access to tourist attractions can be difficult due to distance and lack of public transport, as a result mobility and tourism are strongly interlinked and massively impact one another.
The Cliffs of Moher, for example, is one of Irelands most visited tourist attractions and is accessible by using almost any mode of transport. According to their website there are daily bus services to and from the Cliffs Moher however, this is the only mode of transport available to tourists. An electric bike share based in locations such as Doolin, Liscannor or Lahinch would significantly increase the accessibility to the Cliffs and reduce traffic congestion especially during the peak season.
One of the key aspects of a good tourist attraction is accessibility, how will your customers reach you? While public transport suits some people for others, it simply isn’t an option. This is where shared mobility will have the most impact on the Irish tourism sector, by providing another form of transportation for the masses to these harder to reach attractions and therefore increasing their accessibility and annual footfall.
We have discussed in previous blog posts the positive impact shared mobility has on carbon emissions and how transport choices harm the environment. This is now vitally important to the future of our wildlife, as a study recently produced by UCC states that “birds may fail to adapt fast enough to climate change thus increasing the odds of local extinction”. Sea birds are a key feature of the Cliffs of Moher, and their extinction could prove detrimental to the area.
All in all, the implementation of shared mobility schemes throughout Ireland should be encouraged by the industry as it provides innovative and sustainable mobility solutions to the tourism industry and local community and helps protect our ecosystems and local heritage.
Sources
Cliffs of Moher. Cliffs of Moher. n.d. https://www.cliffsofmoher.ie/plan-your-visit/getting-here/.
Eunjeong Ko, Hyungjoo Kim, and Jinwoo Lee. “Survey Data Analysis on Intention to Use Shared Mobility Services.” (2021).
Lonely Planet. n.d. https://www.lonelyplanet.com/ireland.
Statista. Statista . n.d. https://www.statista.com/statistics/941487/travel-and-tourism-s-total-contribution-to-gdp-in-ireland/. August 2021.