Carpooling
| Author | Date | Message |
|---|---|---|
| Mick Hanney | Apr 25 2024, 2:07pm | Hi, The carpool is a great initiative from IMRA to try cut down on the carbon footprint & congestion at races. I find it difficult to carpool being 'down the country' far from other runners who are mainly Dublin-centric. I ended up not going to Belmont as I didn't want to be that solo driver. Is there a way for the entry lists for races be made public - even just the names - to other runners which would help people know who else was going. It should boost the chances of formal or informal carpooling? People might cite GDPR etc but there should be some way to do this? As someone pointed out in another forum thread, 12 cars in the car pool for a race with over 300 people isn't great, so how does one encourage more? Cheers, Mick |
| Dave Docherty | Apr 25 2024, 2:55pm | Interesting idea, Mick. But it would really only require IMRA to publish where a runner is carpooling from and where they need to get back to after the race. For LL races, a lot of people would go race after work. And any interested parties could click or inquire from there privately. Or modify the carpool slightly, so a runner could post a "lift needed" from village, bus stop, or Luas/train station. If it were a live document, runners could just add or take down the request in real-time, kind of virtual hitching. Probably impractical from a tech point of view, but just riffing on Micks suggestion. |
| Andy McGeady | Apr 25 2024, 3:54pm | Just wondering - was there a car count for yesterday's race? Might be a useful thing to add for future races. Could then gauge the impact of increased car pooling, bike bus, bus/train, etc. over time. |
| Warren Swords | Apr 25 2024, 3:59pm | Ah Mick, you should’ve come. Carpooling is great to reduce car numbers but you’re still allowed come to a race if it isn’t possible. I was a solo driver last night and parked a mile away and jogged to start. |
| Brendan Lawlor | Apr 25 2024, 4:04pm | Hi Andy I counted the vehicles and we had 161 about 15 minutes before race start |
| Brendan Lawlor | Apr 25 2024, 4:06pm | Hi Mick It’s a shame you missed out. I had my car in carpool collecting from Kilmac Car Park which could have suited you. Vivian knew a lovely back road into Belmont as well.. next time hopefully |
| Andy McGeady | Apr 25 2024, 4:17pm | Brendan that's good info. Thank you! |
| Mick Hanney | Apr 25 2024, 5:28pm | Thanks Brendan, your seats were taken by the time I noticed. And, on a positive note, the Wednesday night racing is moving south. |
| Mikey Fry | Apr 25 2024, 9:27pm | Thats a great excuse mick when you don’t want to race:))) |
| Peter O'Farrell | Apr 29 2024, 1:26pm | We could go with incentivisation approach when it comes to the carpooling and/or getting to the race. Walkers/runners/cyclists - start first on the "grid" Public Transport users - second group on the grid Full Carpoolers - third group 3 in a car - fourth group 2 in a car - 5th group single occupancy users - last group Now obviously this is relatively ( completely? ) impractical to organise on the night and if you already start near the back it doesn't affect you, but maybe a 2kg weightbelt to be worn by anyone arriving on their own would help with the incentivisation :) Any one any more practical ideas? |
| Andre Van Barneveld | Apr 29 2024, 1:38pm | Good thread and great initiative. Just a note to those offering carpool, I signed up to get a lift with someone I don't know last weekend but he let me down without letting me know hr wouldn't be going. If you offer a ride but then can't make it, please let those who have signed up know! I like the idea of Mick's suggestion, if you see a name of someone you know it may encourage more sharing? |
| liam kenny | Apr 29 2024, 2:05pm | just a idea that could work, so this will depend on your location of where you travel from, 4 or 5 chat groups set up 1 city and surrounds 2 north wicklow 3 south wicklow north wexford 4 carlow/klidare 5 north dub/meath so if anyone wants to give this a trial send me your number and what group you want to be added ill set up and see how it fairs outs, once added please no crap in chats keep it formal, lifts going lifts wanted etc drop me a message on 0894775782 |
| Dave Docherty | Apr 29 2024, 2:08pm | How about this? People use the existing carpool system to request a lift? https://www.imra.ie/events/view/id/2506 If someone wants to give you a lift they click and both parties are introduced with contact details as normal. |
| Dave Docherty | Apr 29 2024, 2:12pm | Liam, Also a good idea. Fair play for offering to set it up. |
| Peter O'Farrell | Apr 29 2024, 3:27pm | The existing carpooling system is a good start but this and other threads have shown it's not perfect. A small (cultural) change that would really help the planning to carpool for the non-drivers would be early addition of the cars. It's not as much use putting up your car the night before the race as it putting it up there and then when you get to enter the race. This leads to talk of adding work to the webmaster by suggesting adding a prompt on the payment page to add your car to the carpool which is fine but if everyone realised that full cars are the only thing that will keep certain routes viable in the future then perhaps it will become the norm as opposed to the exception. As a for instance; Crone Wood carpark is relatively massive, by Coillte standards, and IMRA alone managed to fill it beyond capacity with cars the last time we were there - in the dark - with no other users! This means that in the daytime on a weekend we haven't a hope of using Crone Wood carpark as a venue into the future with currect car pooling levels. Although I also still like the 2kg weight belt for single car users :) |
| Alan Ayling | Apr 29 2024, 4:38pm | A small wording change on the website could make a big difference. Replace "carpooling" with "dogging". Huge uptake guaranteed. |
| Brendan Lawlor | Apr 29 2024, 4:46pm | https://youtu.be/xMQGoo7xrVY?si=7hzcy_7S61PpvNMm |
| Brendan Lawlor | Apr 29 2024, 5:02pm | I had tried to post an explainer video for Alan’s new technical term but I had a forum malfunction.. look up ‘Fascinating Aida’on You Tube to get a good explanation of the term, but beware if of a sensitive disposition ! |
| Stuart Scott | Apr 29 2024, 5:03pm | Brendan, that seems to be an ad for veggie curry...are you suggesting the curry helps to encourage carpooling or the 'run' itself?! Liam and Dave, those suggestions are both great in fact! A lot of us have our existing informal groups that we've built up over the years but the more opportunities there are for people to link up the better. |
| Niall Corrigan | Apr 30 2024, 9:08am | What about a new column in the results, single occupancy car (SOC) y/n? You need at least 2,or more, “n’s” for and end of year prize. The question would be asked at registration along with the early start question. Impractical? |
| Mick Hanney | Apr 30 2024, 7:49pm | If there is an IT backlog of requests, the idea of being able to seek a lift from the carpool alongside that of offering a lift would be useful. Also, useful to be able to (god forbid) remove your car from the car pool if something changes - I don't think this is possible at the moment. |
| Dave Docherty | Apr 30 2024, 7:58pm | Mick, currently you can both "update" & "delete" your submission on the carpool tab, when logged in. Hence using the current system to request a lift can be changed as the lift requests are satisfied. (god forbid) |
| Miriam Maher | Apr 30 2024, 10:38pm | Great discussion around how to make sure we make the best efforts to get to the races when considering how we get to the races. Yes, there’s a big focus on maximising car pooling for all the many obvious and good reasons we all pretty much know about. Yes, we will keep reminding everyone to car pool where possible. No, single occupancy car drivers are not and should not be frowned upon or have the sense that they need to explain themselves to other fellow racers. Lots of good and valid reasons why it’s not an option for everyone to organise to car pool. So let’s keep the focus on doing what we can do on this front, it’s a key part of the accessibility, inclusivity and sustainability sub group’s focus currently. The aim here is to encourage, not seek to pass judgment or the appearance of doing so. On a personal note - less of the suggestions about carrying extra kgs…I’m doing a grand job of that naturally myself ;-) |
| Mick Hanney | May 1 2024, 7:37am | @Dave, Thanks for pointing that out. Its not intuitively obvious as it appears at the bottom of the carpool page and not beside the booking. I'll know in future. |
| Alan Kennedy | May 2 2024, 9:38am | Great event last last night and car pooling was clearly needed and was being used but there was also a mix based on work, location and many other reasons and that's how it should be. We can try our best but sometimes you just need to get there or home on your own. Thanks to Dave D for reminding us that you can amend your booking. I got requests direct by text so was able to reduce my seats available to stop someone trying to book a car that was in fact full. |
| Brendan Lawlor | May 2 2024, 9:08pm | Hi all For information we had 200 participants in last nights Scarr race and 110 cars and vans |
| Andy McGeady | May 2 2024, 11:24pm | Fair play, Brendan. There will always be times when it’s just not possible to carpool. And that’s ok. Getting out on the hills is its own benefit after all. And there will be times when we can do it. So keeping a general car:runner count is a very very good thing. |
