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Bird's eye view of a highway

Travel & Lift Sharing

How to increase
lift sharing

Travel and transport are among the biggest environmental impacts for sports clubs. Discover how to help parents, players, spectators, and coaches reduce travel emissions through lift sharing and other solutions.

Reasons to Lift Share:

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  • Save time and share the journey with others

  • Save fuel costs

  • Boost morale in your child's team

  • Reduce the environmental impacts and air pollution around training clubs and venues

  • Make training venues safer with less cars.

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Lift Sharing Tips:

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  • Find out who lives in close proximity or enroute

  • Give it a try for a few weeks. You may be concerned that you or other parents may be late. Most people who give it a go are surprised at how well it works!

  • Organise social events so parents get to know each other - as simple as having a cup of coffee together!

  • Share lifts with other parents - This way you don't miss out on watching your child, and you can take it in turns. This also removes any concerns about being responsible for other children.

  • Create a WhatsApp group for lift sharing. It makes it easier for lifts to be arranged outside of other chats that carry on in your team WhatsApp.

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See how this lift-sharing can work in practice through success stories from two sports clubs here.

Case Study: How parents are overcoming lift sharing challenges in Birmingham

Birmingham County FA conducted research with Sustainable Sidekicks as part of a project funded by the Centre for Sustainable Energy to understand more about travel in grassroots football and the barriers and motivations to lift sharing. 

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During interviews with coaches and parents, one of the key barriers cited by parents of younger children cited for doing anything other than driving (walking, cycling, public transport or lift sharing) was the limited time in the early evening before training.

 

When prompted further about lift sharing parents were also concerned that:

  • They or other parents would be late

  • They would miss supporting their child if another parent drove

  • They didn't know other parents following the pandemic.

 

However, researchers also spoke to parents and youth teams who were lift sharing to training. These were people who:

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  • Lived close by - within 1 to 2 miles

  • Travelled with their children so they could watch and support

  • Knew each other from social events put on by coaches. 

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