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MVA Staff get on their bikes to promote smarter travel

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A travel planning consultancy is living up to its reputation as a smarter travel expert after successfully completing a challenge encouraging more people to consider cycling as a sustainable transport alternative.

MVA Consultancy – whose award-winning Smarter Travel Directorate specialises in helping businesses create and implement smarter travel plans – is celebrating after winning its category in the two-week Woking Cycle Challenge.
As advisers to the project, MVA followed up their own guidance by signing up a number of staff to the large organisations group of the competition where 420 groups took part to see who could get the highest percentage to cycle to work.

Mentoring the staff was senior consultant Hal Bransby, who recently pedalled his way to victory in the Woking Tour Series Businesses and Organisations race shortly before completing a gruelling 907-mile charity ride from Land’s End to John O’Groats during National Bike Week.

Hal, who has already raised £900 for African bicycle aid organisation Re~Cycle on his trip, said: “I was given plenty of good advice from the experts in smarter travel at MVA – so I suppose working for a transport consultancy has its advantages.

“It was great to see so many people sign up for the Woking Cycle Challenge too – as we already do a lot of cycling as a firm – and everyone who took part was able to see the benefits quickly.

“We hope all the organisations involved also noticed a positive change in the workplace from looking at encouraging sustainable transport initiatives to promote a healthy, active lifestyle.”
MVA has developed a strong track record of success in the field of smarter travel, having worked on sustainable transport schemes in Falkirk, London and across the UK focusing on Personal Travel Planning (PTP) and reducing single occupancy car journeys of less than five miles. 

To support Hal’s fundraising drive for Re~Cycle visit:
http://www.justgiving.com/mon-fri_out_of_the_office

Information for Editors:

Industry-leader MVA Consultancy provides advice on transport and other policy areas, to central, regional and local government, agencies, developers, operators and financiers

 A diverse group of results-oriented people, we are part of a 500-strong team worldwide. Through client business planning, customer research and strategy development we create solutions that work for real people in the real world.

Smarter travel at MVA

MVA is one of the few consultancies to have a dedicated Smarter Travel Directorate with extensive experience in undertaking smarter choices projects and the development of travel planning measures. The team has been involved in a number of major PTP schemes including leading the roll out of PTP in London – the UK’s largest application of PTP to date.

Key team members

Conrad Haigh, Director of Smarter Travel at MVA Consultancy
Conrad heads up the Smarter Travel division at MVA and was last year recognised for his expertise and track record in the Smarter Travel field, scooping the Travel Planner of the Year award by ACT TravelWise.
With a specialist public sector knowledge and significant experience of devising strategies designed to create behavioural change in transport use, Conrad played an integral role in delivering a workplace travel planning programme across 33 London boroughs.
The Workplace Travel Plan programme obtained more than 1,400 travel plans – 400 of which were voluntary travel plans covering more than 10 per cent of the London workforce – half a million employees.

Sinead Flavin, head of PTP at MVA Consultancy
Sinead has delivered nine PTP projects reaching 240,000 households in the London boroughs of Sutton, Camden, Kingston, Bromley, Waltham Forest, Haringey and Wandsworth. She has also worked on Active Travel in Sydney.
As programme manager for UK’s largest PTP roll out in London from 2004 – 2008, she was responsible for developing a PTP strategy for London, programme managing the development and implementation of the PTP strategy in London, managing a supporting team and stakeholder liaison.
Sinead was also a member of the UK Department for Transport’s Making Personal Travel Planning Work steering group.

For further information please contact:

Emma O'Sullivan on 01483 742925
or email eosullivan@mvaconsultancy.com

or

Sarah White on 01483 742975
or email swhite@mvaconsultancy.com

17 July 2009