To listen to the podcast: https://soundcloud.com/momentum-transport/s2-3-conversations-in-momentum-rachael-murphy-comouk-on-shared-transport
Or read below:
Joe Tang:
Hello everyone and welcome to season two, episode number three of Conversations in Momentum, brought to you by the teams at Momentum Transport Consultancy and Momentum Transport Canada. I’m Joe Tang.
Mailys Garden:
And I’m Mailys Garden. Joe, it’s been a couple of weeks since we recorded the last episode of the podcast and spring has finally arrived here in Narborough. How are things looking down in London?
Joe Tang:
Oh, London’s not too bad. Thank you, Mailys. Although it’s been a busy weekend for the city. For those of you listening, we’re recording this on the Tuesday just after the King’s coronation. So London’s been right in the spotlight at the centre of all of that. There was actually an article before the weekend estimating that there’d be 1.2 million people lining the streets. So quite a challenge from a people movement and transportation perspective.
Mailys Garden:
What a very nice transition into our podcast for today. That’s a perfect lead, thank you, Joe. We’re absolutely delighted to be joined today by Rachael Murphy who’s the Scotland Director at CoMoUK. And CoMoUK is the National Organisation for Shared Transport, a charity for promoting its social, economic and environmental benefits. Rachael, welcome to Conversations in Momentum.
Rachael Murphy:
Thank you so much for having me. It’s great to be with you.
Joe Tang:
Oh, thank you very much for joining us, Rachael. To start things off on our podcast at Conversations in Momentum, we always start by asking our guests to share a transport related story or a highlight from their career. So what would be yours?
Rachael Murphy:
I’ve been really trying to think of a solid answer for this that kind of gets the right balance of showy-offy, great transport habits and entertaining. I am a Londoner by birth and my family has never had a car. I was kind of trying to think of why did this never bother me as a child and was thinking that the first two cars I ever remember seeing were the car from Harry Potter when they brought it to King’s Cross station for the second movie and Chitty Chitty Bang Bang when it came to Alexandra Palace. So I think if a car doesn’t fly, have wings, do amazing things, frankly I’m not very interested in it. So I think that’s partly how I’ve ended up so keen on shared transport because the sort of exciting private car thing does very little for me. If it doesn’t fly, I’m not bothered.
Mailys Garden:
Right. This is possibly one of my favourite stories I have to say. You managed to talk about Harry Potter in a transport podcast, which two Fashions United. I’m really pleased. Thank you so much Rachel. Great, great, great story. I’ve got to say, this is my favourite question of the entire podcast, but we do have to talk about the wider transport stuff as well. So I sort of tried to provide a very brief intro to what CoMoUK does in the introduction a few more minutes ago. But would you be able to tell us a little bit more about your organisation and its work.
Rachael Murphy:
Of course, absolutely. For transport veterans, they might know CoMoUK as Carplus and then Carplus Bikeplus, that’s what we used to be. But CoMo is short for collaborative mobility as you said earlier, and we’re really about all forms of shared transport. So be that car clubs, bike share, digital demand responsive transport, e-scooters, community versions of those services where they exist. And also mobility hubs, so the physical built infrastructure that can really bring this stuff together. Our work looks like a lot of different things. So in Scotland we have a work plan that we deliver on behalf of Transport Scotland of activities around shared. And across the UK we do all sorts of collaborations with local authorities and transport organisations. We offer some consultancy services. We’re the accreditor for car clubs, bike share, and for mobility hubs. We do some policy work, but I think for most people, the thing that will be the standout thing they know about CoMo is our research because year-on-year we publish car club and bike share research, which just really demonstrates the growth year-on-year of both of these sectors.
So it’s a lot of different activities. I mentioned our work plan earlier, as you mentioned in the intro, directive of Scotland with CoMo, and I think some of the things we’re doing in the work plan this last year and going into this new year are the ones that I just sort of, I suppose wanted to give a little shout-out to. We’re doing some really exciting stuff with ScotRail, looking at railway stations, how we can improve connections to and from them. I think there’s so much to be done there that currently we’re not hitting. So I’m really excited, that we’re a really small team but that we can just start to make some of those connections in Scotland. And we’ve got some great stuff going on in the coming year, so it’s lovely to be here and chat about it a wee bit more.
Joe Tang:
That sounds brilliant, Rachael. Thank you. And sounds like a huge amount of variety and a huge amount of work that I’m sure keeps you very busy.
Rachael Murphy:
Yes, yes. Busy is a nice positive way of putting it, very busy, we’ve got lots on it and you’re totally right the variety is brilliant.
Joe Tang:
No, it’s excellent. Linking on to that, obviously as transport consultants, we’re all very aware of the environmental social economic benefits of shared transport and the potential of some newer modes that are coming through as well. Things like e-bikes and e-scooters. It’d be really interesting to pick your brains on some of the very interesting research that you’ve undertook relating to this. I believe some of the recent stuff showed that Scotland’s Car Club membership rose by fifth last year and replaced more than 8,000 privately owned vehicles. And that nearly half a million journeys were made with shared bikes in 2022. So that’s all fascinating findings. Why do you think there’s been such an increase in these modes?
Rachael Murphy:
I love hearing somebody else say the numbers because they are genuinely, I think, remarkable. I mean I think it’s one of the best things about CoMos role is shared transport makes sense. I think it’s popular with people with local authorities. I think we are in an age where sharing is more and more how we access goods, be it Spotify, be it streaming TV, be it tool libraries to do DIY at home. I think we are moving as society as we absolutely should be towards greater use of shared assets. And so I think you can see that coming across in the way that we access transport. You can only really own a car, most people can afford a car, a bike, but suddenly being able to access exactly as you said, e-bikes, e-scooters, a cargo bike, should that be what you need. A van if you’re getting things from IKEA.
I think just the variety of things that you can access without owning is really remarkable and I think it speaks to the desires that people have. I think one of the other things is commuter patterns are of course radically different post COVID. And as much as we may feel like we’re settling into something, they are erratic. Most people are not going Monday to Friday to the office. So families that maybe had two cars, could they suddenly look at a car and some shared options just to supplement that. I think we’re seeing those changes reflected in the increased usership. And I think as well, it’s a virtuous circle.
The more shared people see on the street corner, the more people they know accessing these services, the more likely they are to get involved as well. We did a piece of work last year within the Scotland team about users and non-users. And what to me I think really stood out with non-users was they just had no idea what it was. There was a car with a different logo on the side and it wasn’t something that they knew how to access. So I think just physical presence over time will create a virtuous cycle. Maybe I’m being overly optimistic, but I do think the more people see it, the more people know about it, the benefits are obvious and will only see these trends increase and increase.
Mailys Garden:
I have to say I completely agree with that visibility elements of living in Narborough, in Scotland, we have loads of car clips in particular on the city centre streets. And I don’t think that we’re that visible in other cities where I’ve lived before. So I don’t know if it’s just a case of its just time that we see more or it’s just particularly important here. But it really makes a difference in terms of reminding you every time you pass them that they are indeed other options that then owning private cars. So that’s a really good point and it’s really, really interesting to hear about the success in Scotland. And I was wondering if you could share more examples of schemes that you think have worked particularly well in the UK and perhaps touch on what you think is holding us back from seeing more use of share transport in our towns and cities. So it’s a two part question. So first around what’s what’s worked well elsewhere in the UK and second, what’s holding us back please?
Rachael Murphy:
Yeah, of course, absolutely. I think there are so many good examples. I was thinking about this before joining today. What were the elements that I really wanted to shout about and there are so many good examples. But I think I’ll touch on a couple that are sort of close to my heart because they’re ones that I’ve had personal experience of. The first one I wanted to mention was the e-scooters in York. I was there with my colleagues a couple of months ago and we were there for a day. It wasn’t a big chunk of time. My expectations of how much of York I would see were really low. And we took the scooters out as a group, some were on e-bikes, some were on scooters and what we were able to cover to enjoy to access the city just increased tenfold by using the shared transport option that was there.
And I think I just felt really able to enjoy it as a user rather than sort of a transport nerd because it can be quite difficult to switch off that bit of your brain and actually going, “Yeah, this is just really good fun.” I really enjoyed I think a more transport nerdy option that I always enjoy because I think it’s just a fantastic collaboration between an operator and a local authority is the car clubs in Aberdeen. So what Aberdeen City Council have done is where there are new developments being built, there’s expectations around minimum numbers of car clubs and that is the default option when people are moving into that area. I think we all know when we look at behaviour change, that moments in people’s lives where everything’s already up in the air, be that going to uni a new job, a new city kid, kids, whatever it might be, those are the moments where your behaviours most likely to change.
So I think that focus on new homes, new beginnings, I’ve always just really liked as a way of just finding new opportunities to impact how people travel. So I’ve always really liked that as an example, I think I love the big inner city options. That’s always what I most like to use because I’m a bit of a city girl. But actually I couldn’t let the session go without talking about some of the rural options that we see where you’ve got a community running something for themselves, often in collaboration with a bigger operator, but it’s really locally branded. It responds to local issues and they’re dotted all over the UK and I have to say lots of them are in Scotland. I think particularly where you see islands who are sick of really high levels of tourism where people are bringing so many cars onto their beautiful island. Actually having car clubs or bike share there that people can access, what an amazing opportunity and it’s just filling such an obvious need that we have.
So I think as much as I do, I love the big inner city schemes and I think that’s where you’ll probably see the most change. Actually I love to see communities just doing stuff for themselves, I think that’s so brilliant. To the less fun half through your question, what’s holding us back? I think one of the hardest things to do is accept that shared transport on its own will not fix these problems. If the infrastructure isn’t good enough, be that cycle infrastructure roads, if there aren’t priority bus lanes that DRT vehicles can access, you can have the best scheme going, but if the environment in which you’re asking people to use it is just not of a good enough standard, then the scheme will suffer from that. So I think part of it is going, “What can the scheme realistically do and what needs to happen around it?”
I think as well that also speaks to that virtuous circle point I made earlier where you’ve got a mode working really well. People who use one mode of shared transport are far more likely to go on to use others. So I think having multiple options that allow people to do a more holistic journey is super key. I think money is the obvious elephant in the room. There’s not a huge amount of it going around at the moment, but I think it’s not just what you spend, it’s how you spend it. I think particularly in Scotland, we are in a bit of a habit of short term pilots that don’t last long enough to either show behaviour change amongst citizens or really to learn lessons locally. Or to be able to share those lessons as transferable knowledge to other areas. So I think there are definitely some things that are holding us back, but I don’t think they’re insurmountable problems either.
Joe Tang:
That’s really interesting stuff linking in that, you’ve obviously touched upon the work in Scotland there and Scotland and the UK in general obviously have very ambitious climate change targets to meet over the next few years. And active travel and shared transport are two of the tools that will help us move close to those targets and play a huge factor in that. What in your opinion, are the things we can be doing in the industry as a whole to keep seeing positive change and change that you’ve mentioned there and to help us reach those goals?
Rachael Murphy:
That’s such a good question. I think if I could answer that perfectly, I’d be a millionaire. I think there’s a couple of things that we all need to get better at doing. I think we need to be realistic. As I say, no one option is a panacea. No one scheme solution can ever fix the wider issues. And I think we do need to look at this stuff contextually. I mean, as I mentioned earlier, we’ve done some work on rail. One of the most interesting things we’ve done in that is about how you balance privately owned bikes and shared bikes because one or the other is not going to be enough. So I think a big part of it is about being realistic about what exists, what can exist year-on-year on year and not going, “We’re going to fix everything next week.”
This stuff does, it takes time. Massive behaviour change, of course it’s not going to be immediate. I think being positive is super key. Whether a scheme goes well or it goes badly, there are lessons to be learned and we should be more honest about what those lessons are, where they apply to other locales, but also celebrating those successes. As I say, there are some really good things happening and do we do enough to promote them? I think we can always do more. I think that’s one of the great things about working at CoMo is there is always a new opportunity to celebrate good work that’s being done somewhere in the UK. But I also think there is something about, as much as I’ve said, be realistic, we also need to be really ambitious. The planet is on fire. That is the harsh reality of where we sit. And I think you know mentioned those targets, the targets in and of themselves are not enough.
The action has to be as ambitious if not more so than the targets because frankly a nice government website is not going to do us any good if the planet is on fire. That’s a really miserable way to phrase it, but you know what I mean. We need to match action to our targets and accept that it will eventually mean that things are not always successful. Not every intervention will necessarily be a guaranteed success, but we need to radically change the way that we live and travel and produce. We can’t all just switch from our own private fuel cars to our own private electrics. That’s not going to fix the problems we have. So not just changes in fuel, changes in every aspect of how we travel, how we live are key. So I think realistic, positive, ambitious would be the sort of headlines for me.
Mailys Garden:
I think that makes perfect sense. And you’re right, there’s no one solution that’s going to make us all millionaires and actually that’s probably not what we need. We probably need a bit of rethink of how everything works. Yes, no, absolutely. That leads us onto our final question, Rachael, which I have great hopes about. I’d like to ask you if you had one transport wish, what would it be and why?
Rachael Murphy:
That’s a really good question. Other than obviously becoming a millionaire with my brilliant transport solution, that’s obviously wish number one. More seriously I think being more playful in transport is key. We have become very focused on transport solutions being good for us, good for the environment, and they absolutely should be those things. Those are the baseline. But my younger cousins want to sit in sporty cars and room about and play rubbish music out of big boom boxes. The other option to have to compete with that, I think transport can be more fun because we need not just to convince the people who are already on our team, who already see the benefits.
We need to convince people that have spent all of their childhoods, teenage years young adulthoods, believing that car is king, car is success, car is independence and freedom. We need to present a viable alternative to that. And part of that has to be fun, it has to be affordable, it has to work for your day to day, whatever that looks like. And so I think fun, freewheeling, lots of options, that’s one big wish. Can I squeeze all of that into my one wish? Is that allowed?
Mailys Garden:
That’s so allowed and it is such an important point I’ve got to say. I was reading the DFT report on e-scooters that came out at the beginning of the year and actually one of the thing that stuck with me was exactly that. As transport planners, we look at cost of transport and convenience of getting from A to B to C and trip training, et cetera. But actually quite a lot of the respondents talked about the pure enjoyment of transport. And where I think the private car was tremendously successful in becoming a dominant mode of transports that because it also sold a lifestyle in an image and there was just a brilliant element of selling to people. Yeah, exactly that, a lifestyle. And I think there’s a lot more that we can do to making our journeys more fun. Thank you, that’s a really great point. Rachael, our time’s up but thank you so much for taking the time to join us today. We’ve loved having you on the podcast.
Rachael Murphy:
Thank you so much. No, it’s been great to chat and obviously really keen to be involved in these conversations in the future.
Joe Tang:
It’s been brilliant to have you Rachael, thank you very much for joining us and thank you for the listener for joining us as well. As always, we’ll be keeping the conversations going on LinkedIn, but for now it’s bye from all of us at Conversations in Momentum and we’ll see you next time.
