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Full Circle
Lawyer Geraldine Collins at law firm Maurice Blackburn recently rediscovered the benefits of riding to work and now rides her hybrid bike to the Sunshine office several times each week.
“I went to a Bicycle Victoria breakfast for the Tour de France this year and started riding again the next day,” the Principal and TAC specialist said.
“The breakfast was the motivation I needed to remember how pleasant it is to ride my bike, and it’s better for the environment, too. Hopefully Bicycle Victoria’s Ride to Work Day will encourage more people to change their commuting habits.
“Maurice Blackburn provides legal services to Bicycle Victoria, so it’s nice to be supporting their efforts. We’ve gone full circle.”
Lyn Honan is a Senior Associate at Maurice Blackburn and organiser of the firm’s participation in the Ride to Work Day on 14 October.
About 20 riders in the firm have already registered for the day, and they are also supporting a new group called Legal Riders, who are hosting Bicycle Victoria’s members’ rights initiative launch on the same day.
Lyn has a bike for every season, she rides 22km from Sandringham to the firm’s Melbourne office two or three times per week, and she is also a regular on Beach Road, but her heart lies with the longer rides.
“I have completed the Around the Bay a couple of times, the Fruit Loop Ride at Shepparton and the Audax Alpine Classic (Mt Buffalo/Bright options),” Ms Honan said.
“I cycled around France following Le Tour de France and many parts of Australia including the Gibb River Road, Daintree National Park, Stuart Highway between Alice Springs and Darwin, and off-road at Lysterfield National Park and the Mawson Trail from Adelaide to Blinman.”
Brooke Dellavedova believes her Kona Dew Deluxe is a great bike for commuting. The Senior Associate lives in Preston with her husband and two kids, and rides to work in the CBD most days.
“I take the central bike path down St Georges Road and then Rathdowne Street through Carlton,” she said.
“My pet hate is people that stop their cars in the bike lanes in the CBD so they can drop people off or talk on their mobile phones.”
For firm Financial Manager Robert Batt, cycling to work gives him pleasure.
“Sometimes a smug pleasure of zooming past motorists stuck in rush hour and sometimes a purer pleasure of watching the morning break over the city,” Robert said.
“Melbourne has great bike paths and I only share the road for about 1km in the CBD, which is okay as the cars don’t go so fast there.
“The main reason I started biking to work was because I had more control of my commute time and expense. I found the train services too full or delayed or worst still cancelled. Driving and paying for parking was too expensive and took forty five minutes.
“Cycling the 9km to work takes me 30 minutes, regardless of the weather or the traffic conditions. A quick shower and I am ready for the day having already done an effective work out. I love commuting by bike.”
Super Commuter – Mark Lister
Mark Lister is a super commuter who walks the talk. During the day, he works for a business focussed on reducing greenhouse gas emissions in commercial buildings, so it is fitting that he rides to work and uses his bike for short trips.
Apart from his 18km round trip to work and home and riding to business meetings, Mark also does a weekly kindergarten run with his son and his son’s friend.
“The kids love going to kindy in our two-seat bike trailer, and it’s more convenient to ride than drive,” Mark said.
Mark rides not only because it’s better fro the environment, but also because it’s a cheap, fun and quick mode of transport that doesn’t congest our roads.
He believes that riding is much safer than some people think, especially when using bicycle lanes and paths throughout the city.
Helmeted Employees Good for Business
Businesses that encourage staff to cycle to work benefit from increased productivity as a result of improved fitness and mental health.
Riding to work also ensures that people arrive at work motivated and exhilarated and ready to hit the ground running. By encouraging cycling to work absenteeism can be reduced by up to 80%. For longer distances, staff can combine cycling with other forms of travel, such as public transport.
The fact is healthy employees are more efficient and productive, Swedish researchers found fit workers make 60% fewer errors on jobs involving concentration and short-term memory [ii].
For organisations that invest in cycling strategies there is a return on investment to be gained. The UK Traffic Advisory Unit found that organisations that implemented cycling strategies received a return between $1.33 and $6.50 for every $1 spent in cycle promotion, resulting from increased productivity [iii].
Some direct financial benefits gained by an organisation that promotes a cycle-friendly policy are:
o Reduction in car fleet costs
o Reduction in fuel costs
o Reduction in fringe benefits tax
o Reduction in registration/insurance/licensing/RACV membership fees
o Reduction in tyre, servicing, and repair costs
o Reduction in taxi costs in and around the city
o Reduction in car parking costs (10 bicycles can be parked in one car space)
o Reduction in car parking levies
o Reduction in petrol cards
o Reduction in car parking costs.Cycle friendly policies also aid a company in tackling climate change and increasing their carbon offsets.
A company’s carbon footprint and environmental practices are becoming increasingly important to employees when selecting an employer, embracing a cycle-friendly policy is a great way to do this.
[i] [iii] Travel Smart Australia, www. travelsmart.gov.au, Travel Smart Employers Kit,
[ii] Sport & Recreation New Zealand, Cycle-friendly Employers, Cycle-Friendly Employer Guide
Telstra proves smart with pedal power
Marking the launch of Ride to Work Day ’09, Telstra was awarded first place in the TravelSmart National Workplace Challenge ’08 at Bicycle Victoria’s annual Tour de France Breakfast series.
Telstra, a strong nationwide participant in Ride to Work Day are back to back winners of the TravelSmart Challenge in ’08 with 681 participants, an 18% increase on ’07, giving Telstra the largest number of registered participating employees in National Ride to Work Day ’08.
Group Managing Director of Telstra Consumer Marketing and Channels, David Moffatt, who accepted the award, is a strong supporter of the annual event and has come on board in 2009 as an official National Ambassador.
"We are happy to encourage every Telstra employee to ride to work so they can reap the physical benefits, as well as the environmental benefits of leaving the car at home,” Mr Moffatt said.
CSIRO came in second with NAB following at a close third.
The Ride to Work program estimates that more than 110,000 Australian workers participated in National Ride to Work Day last year, a 26% increase in registrations on the previous year.
These three large corporations are leading the way encouraging employees to adopt this sustainable and beneficial mode of transport, supporting the annual event that gets people thinking about cycling and encourages them to have a go.
Warrnambool City Council aiming to hit the 100 mark for another Ride to Work Day
Strong supporters of National Ride to Work Day, City of Warrnambool have been hosting community breakfasts since 2005.
In 2008 87 people from all walks of life attend their breakfast at The Team Room at Flagstaff Hill. Some of the attendees even cycled over 20 km to the event from Koriot and Cudgee. Ride to Work Ambassador and City of Warrnambool Councilor Jacinta Ermacora came in riding on a lovely red bike.
Highlights of their breakfast included the delicious Bakers Delight warm danishes and scones, children arriving in the "bike cart” and enjoying the beautiful morning looking over Flagstaff Hill with mist rolling in from the sea and roosters crowing in the back ground.
The entire town of Warrnambool got behind the event, the community spirit and comrade is contagious. Upon arrival at the breakfast riders placed a "dot" on the map to show where they cycled from giving them a great sense of pride that they made it.
Breakfast participants had the chance to win prizes every half hour ranging from cycling prize packs to gold passes to Aquazone.
When asked if the City of Warrnambool is planning on getting behind the event again in 2009 Nicole Wood, TravelSmart Officer for Warrnambool City Council replied “Absolutely, we aim to hit the 100 mark!”
Wood says “I love that this is a way "commuter" cyclists can get together.
I really encourage people to get a team together and come and join us.
For more information on the City of Warrnambool visit www.warrnambool.vic.gov.au
View the pdf of this article here.
Find out more about community breakfasts are occuring in your local area.
Nick has lost 15kg simply by riding to work!
Nick received a bike for Christmas in 2007 and has been riding regularly since January 2008. Having been an occasional runner for many years he took up riding as it was a lower impact sport and wanted to set himself a personal physical challenge to ride in the ‘Around the Bay in a day’.
Nick lives in Blackburn (Victoria) and rides into work in Melbourne CBD twice a week along the Eastern Freeway bike track which is a 26km, one hour, one way commute. If Nick were to catch the train into work it would take him the same amount of time, door to door.
Nick has been riding to work since January 2008 and during this time he hasn’t changed his diet at all but lost 15kg simply by riding twice a week. He notices that he arrives to work with more energy and also sleeps better on the days that he rides.
Within his workplace at Money Managers there is a cycle friendly culture with shower facilities and bike storage.
The only influencing factors that alter Nick’s decision to ride into work is the weather and if he has early morning meetings.
Nick’s wife has also taken up riding again and rides a hybrid. She drives part way into the city, drops the kids at school and then rides into work in the city.
Nicks’ advice to new riders is to:
• Plan your route
• Decide what kind of bike you will ride according to your route (e.g. some road bikes are better off kept on the road rather than on some of the bike tracks)
• Leave a change of clothes at work so you don’t have to carry as many things in with you.
Support the people who support your bike riding. Join Bicycle Victoria.
