- By offering free coffee for leaving the car at home, the University of Sheffield removed over 2,400 car commutes in the last academic year
- Staff and students use an app called BetterPoints to log active and sustainable travel and earn points
- In the last academic year, over 780,000 miles of walking and 190,000 miles of cycling has been logged by University staff and students
- The app is also available to all residents of Sheffield, supported by Sheffield City Council
The University of Sheffield has directly removed almost 2,400 commuting journeys from Sheffield’s roads in the last year by offering free coffees in return for staff leaving their cars at home.
Through the BetterPoints app, which the University offers to all staff and students, users who drove to campus the previous week were sent a message offering a free coffee if they use alternative forms of transport, such as walking, cycling, tram or bus, to come to university. The scheme ran 33 times during the 2023/24 academic year, resulting in 72 fewer cars coming to campus on average each time, totaling 2,376 journeys.
As well as reducing the number of cars on these specific dates, the app rewards users for making active and sustainable travel choices throughout the year. Around 6,300 staff and students are registered with the programme, and between them they have recorded over 1.4 million active and sustainable journeys during the last academic year, over 950,000 of which replaced a car journey. This includes over 780,000 miles of walking, 190,000 miles of cycling, and 175,000 bus, tram and train trips.
Users can spend their points on a range of rewards, with the most popular being free coffees at the University’s cafes. Almost 14,000 free hot drinks were given out last year, all in reusable cups; to help reduce waste, a drink in a single-use cup costs twice as many points.
Darren Hardwick, Sustainable Travel Manager at the University of Sheffield, said: “We’re always looking for ways to encourage staff and students to make sustainable choices on campus, and travel is a great example of this. We want to reward sustainable behaviours, rather than punish people for choices that might be outside of their control.
“We know that for many people driving to work is their only practical option, perhaps because of distance travelled or caring responsibilities. However, if we can encourage those that could leave their cars at home to do so, it means less traffic and more parking space for those that don’t have this option, as well as reduced carbon emissions and improved air quality.”
Jack Windle, Head of Sustainable Transport at BetterPoints, said: “The University of Sheffield has long been a respected leader in promoting sustainable transport and we're proud to be a partner in its work. The 'leave the car for coffee' initiative is an innovative intervention that we piloted and developed with the University and that we're now rolling out elsewhere. The initiative is part of our Step Up programme, which has grown through collaboration with lots of agencies across the University and now supports the institution's wider sustainability and health and wellbeing agendas. Step Up also led to our partnership with Sheffield City Council, helping the whole city to make better choices for transport, health and climate.”
Following the success of the app at the University of Sheffield, Sheffield City Council has made BetterPoints available to all residents of the city.
Cllr Ben Miskell, Chair of the Transport, Regeneration and Climate Policy Committee, said: “Sheffield is a fantastic city, a city filled with amazing things to do, see and experience for those students continuing their education at the University of Sheffield. Using the BetterPoints app to explore everything the city has to offer is a brilliant way of finding your next favourite shop, café and night spot while, at the same time, building up rewards.
“Sheffield is transforming into a city geared towards offering people even more choice in how they get around, from improved walking and cycle routes to developing a first-class public transport network and, with the BetterPoints app, you will be able to take full advantage of it.”