Have you considered car-pooling from Pencaitland? – Pencaitland and District Community Council

With recent news about the unwelcome closure of vital bus routes to Pencaitland and Ormiston this June, you may be interested to know that there are still ways to get from A to B thanks to car pooling.

Tripshare allows you to car pool with others whilst reducing costs, road traffic and pollution at the same time. Click to find out more.

Car pooling is the act of sharing a private car to get to a mutually agreed destination at a prearranged time. In a local context that might be car-sharing from Pencaitland to Tranent or Wallyford in the morning in order to catch public transport into town… and back again at the end of the workday. Alternatively it might be a commute directly to the city.

The advantages of this approach are pretty clear. A car with four seats fully utilised will spread the fuel costs amongst four people. It also means just one round trip compared to four separate cars on the roads, each with just one commuter.

It’s not only a more economical and social practice, it’s also much more environmentally aware, reducing unnecessary road trips and pollution.

You don’t have to own a car to participate. If you do have your own transport then you can arrange to take turns driving, thus using your car perhaps 75% less than before. This reduces wear and tear and, of course, fuel costs.

Interested? Then find out more about East Lothian’s very own TripShareEastLothian service.

As the website explains, “Tripshare has been created so that you may actively search for other members who are doing similar journeys at similar times. Tripshare has the capability of matching all types of journeys. This scheme will not only allow members to share car journeys if you wish, but also to choose to share taxi journeys, and to choose to cycle and walk together.”

The website costs nothing to use and forms part of the UK’s National liftshare network. It is restricted to people aged 18 and over.

PS – Do you already car-pool from Pencaitland or other villages in and around the area? Please tell us about it below and whether it’s been a success for you?

Pencaitland Community Council

There’s mention of this story about Car Pooling in the recent issue of the East Lothian Courier. It suggests that Pencaitland Community Council is encouraging residents to take part in Car Pooling.

Whilst it makes sense on many levels to car pool we also recognise that this is by no means a practical alternative to a properly constituted, regular and affordable bus service which residents all over the county would want to use.

Car pooling is undoubtedly a sensible and efficient use of private transport but there will always be occasions where nothing less than an affordable public transport scheme will do the job.

The Courier’s website allows article comments and the following, more detailed reply was made there:

Comment from ‘Inspector Blakey’: “”Pencaitland Community Council has used its website – http://pencaitland.org/ – to encourage residents to take part in car pooling.

Yip how to keep Buses running in Pencaitland ……..so if people use their car instead of the bus……it will make the economics of running a regular bus route even harder…never mind offering lower fares.

Thus creating a viscous circle….. “”

As the person who published that article on the Pencaitland Community website I want to stress that we are not advocating an either…or solution here. We absolutely need a working, reliable and affordable bus service which people will actually want to use.

But we also need to be pragmatic enough to realise that, thus far, the administration has not showered itself in glory in terms of its public transport policy.

Clearly individuals who need to get to the city need to be thinking ahead in terms of their own situation and planning a strategy that takes account of the very fluid issues we’re dealing with in terms of rural public transport right now. By highlighting the existing ELC backed car-pooling service it’s primarily about bringing it to commuters’ attention.

Will it undermine public transport services? It would seem that past administration policy has pretty much done this already.

Should we deny people knowledge of what they can do if they find themselves at a total loss when First winds up its routes?

Obviously it’s to be hoped that the ELC administration resolves this crisis before the crunch comes and puts in place a service which will revive local/rural interest in bus use. As has been mentioned in other comments on this topic, it’s fairly clear that First did not price the route to drive use.

Car sharing in general ought to be encouraged. Equally bus use over car use ought to take precedence in terms of priorities. As a community council all we can do is keep our community appraised of what’s going on and what, if any, alternatives there are in light of recent events.

Cheers

Ralph
Resident & Chair, Pencaitland Community Council

378 thoughts on “Have you considered car-pooling from Pencaitland?”

Ralph Averbuch 15 April 2012

There’s mention of this story about Car Pooling in the recent issue of the East Lothian Courier. It suggests that Pencaitland Community Council is encouraging residents to take part in Car Pooling.

Whilst it makes sense on many levels to car pool we also recognise that this is by no means a practical alternative to a properly constituted, regular and affordable bus service which residents all over the county would want to use.

Car pooling is undoubtedly a sensible and efficient use of private transport but there will always be occasions where nothing less than an affordable public transport scheme will do the job.

The Courier’s website allows article comments and the following, more detailed reply was made there:

Comment from ‘Inspector Blakey’: “”Pencaitland Community Council has used its website – http://pencaitland.org/ – to encourage residents to take part in car pooling.

Yip how to keep Buses running in Pencaitland ……..so if people use their car instead of the bus……it will make the economics of running a regular bus route even harder…never mind offering lower fares.

Thus creating a viscous circle….. “”

As the person who published that article on the Pencaitland Community website I want to stress that we are not advocating an either…or solution here. We absolutely need a working, reliable and affordable bus service which people will actually want to use.

But we also need to be pragmatic enough to realise that, thus far, the administration has not showered itself in glory in terms of its public transport policy.

Clearly individuals who need to get to the city need to be thinking ahead in terms of their own situation and planning a strategy that takes account of the very fluid issues we’re dealing with in terms of rural public transport right now. By highlighting the existing ELC backed car-pooling service it’s primarily about bringing it to commuters’ attention.

Will it undermine public transport services? It would seem that past administration policy has pretty much done this already.

Should we deny people knowledge of what they can do if they find themselves at a total loss when First winds up its routes?

Obviously it’s to be hoped that the ELC administration resolves this crisis before the crunch comes and puts in place a service which will revive local/rural interest in bus use. As has been mentioned in other comments on this topic, it’s fairly clear that First did not price the route to drive use.

Car sharing in general ought to be encouraged. Equally bus use over car use ought to take precedence in terms of priorities. As a community council all we can do is keep our community appraised of what’s going on and what, if any, alternatives there are in light of recent events.

Cheers

Ralph
Resident & Chair, Pencaitland Community Council

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