March 19, 2013 | Posted by Jemma Percy
Tags: carbon, Legacy, LOCOG, Olympics, Paralympics, sponsors, transport
The Commission has completed its assurance of BP’s Target Neutral Programme. BP was appointed by London 2012 as the Olympic and Paralympic Games offset partner for official travel. In addition, BP established a voluntary programme which offered to offset travel related carbon emissions for spectators, London 2012 corporate partners and the wider ‘Olympic family’ such as athletes and country delegations. The Target Neutral Programme: “…is an initiative that provides information and tools primarily through a website (www.bptargetneutral.com) but also other channels such as Facebook, to support the reduction of carbon footprints. The information and tools are structured around three topic areas: ‘Reduce, Replace and Neutralise’. Participants are encouraged to reduce their travel emissions, for example by replacing car journeys with public transport, by driving ‘smarter’, driving less and maintaining vehicles better. Participants are also encouraged to consider new fuel-efficient vehicle technologies such as high efficiency engines and improved tyres, or products that may support vehicle efficiency such as “BP Ultimate Fuels” and BP’s “Castrol” lubricants. The ‘Neutralise’ stream encourages participants to offset the carbon emissions from unavoidable travel, and provides the facility to offset”[1] The Commission for a Sustainable London 2012 (‘CSL’ / ‘The Commission’) decided to conduct assurance of …
November 14, 2012 | Posted by Jemma Percy
Tags: active travel, carbon, LOCOG, Olympic Park, stadium, transport, waste
The Commission for a Sustainable London 2012 has published its in-depth review into whether the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games truly delivered the promised levels of sustainability. The post-Games report, entitled London 2012 – From Vision to Reality, presents the final conclusions through key sustainability themes, with information based on first-hand observations and data gathered by the Commission during Games-time. The report concludes that the London 2012 Games broadly delivered against its sustainability objectives, and highlights several examples of leading practice which the Commission urges future Olympic and Paralympic organisers to follow. Using today’s release of its post-Games report, the Commission has called on the UK to lead the charge in ensuring London’s lessons are firmly embedded into the events industry. Ambitious sustainability targets such as zero waste to landfill and 70% waste to be re-used, recycled or composted are on track thanks to efforts such as meticulous attention to packaging and the effective use of the colour coded three-bin system. The transport system delivered an excellent service, and London 2012 should be praised for being the first Games to offer a fully comprehensive mobility service. Comprehensive public transport options and effective planning meant that the logistical operation for …
| Posted by Shaun McCarthy
Tags: active travel, carbon, construction, labour standards, Legacy, LOCOG, transport, waste
I was eight years old when England won the world cup in 1966. I can’t claim to remember the oft repeated commentary from Kenneth Wolstenholme “They think it’s all over – it is now” as Geoff Hurst completed his unique hat-trick to beat West Germany 4-2 in extra time but of course this is now the stuff of legend. Team GB and Paralympics GB made an equally legendary contribution to our sporting heritage. Maybe the choice of a lion as a mascot has something to do with it; Team GB and Paralympics GB had Pride the Lion and in more innocent times in 1966 we had World Cup Willie. They think the London 2012 Olympic Games are all over but from a sustainability point of view this is the end of the beginning. Today sees the release of our report entitled “London 2012 – From vision to reality“. It documents the fantastic effort made by my team to get to practically every Olympic venue with the exception of the football stadia. Not bad for a team of four people in a few short weeks. We also visited live sites, logistics hubs, waste transfer stations and numerous other “back of house” …
September 5, 2012 | Posted by Shaun McCarthy
Tags: accessibilty, disabled people, Legacy, Paralympics, TFL, transport, tube
As we continue to cheer on ParalympicsGB in their superhuman effort to overhaul their record medals tally in Beijing, it is time to start applauding another slightly less obvious superhuman effort by Peter Hendy and his team at Transport for London. The doom mongers predicted disaster, London’s creaking Victorian transport system would not be able to cope with the vast numbers visiting London for the Games. It all worked well during the Olympics despite these gloomy predictions. “Ah”, said the cynics “wait until the Paralympics in September, the kids will be back at school, everybody will return to work, then the system will go into meltdown”. The theory was that everybody who was not interested in the Games stayed out of town in August but they would all return in September and the system would be unable to cope. On the Tuesday of the final week of competition this has not happened to date. My team travelled to all London venues and found the tube lines to be very busy as they often are at peak times. The Docklands Light Railway struggled a little and there were some queues but nothing like the queues of several hours that were predicted. …
August 28, 2012 | Posted by Shaun McCarthy
Tags: active travel, cycle hire scheme, cycling, LOCOG, secure cycle parking, TFL, transport
It was great to see the ODA and LOCOG promoting cycling as a way to get to the Paralympics yesterday. Gold medal winner Joanna Rowsell is helping to promote cycling as a great way to get around. Over the past five years, London has become a much more cycle friendly city with thousands of people enjoying cycling as a cheap, sustainable and healthy way to experience our great city. The addition of the bright “Boris Bikes” means that you don’t even have to own a bike to enjoy this unique pleasure. Cycling gives you the full experience of the city, all the sights, sounds and smells and is the quickest way to travel over short journeys, along with walking. Travelling by car, bus or taxi is like observing the city through a TV screen. The subterranean experience of the Tube does not give you an experience of the city at all but it remains the fastest and most efficient way to travel for longer journeys. London 2012 has made a great effort to promote cycling as a way of getting to the Games as part of the Active Travel programme. A total of 7,200 secure bike parking places have been provided, along with web-based maps …
August 10, 2012 | Posted by Shaun McCarthy
Tags: energy, health, labour standards, LOCOG, mascots, merchandise, ODA, Olympic Park, transport
Like Jessica Ennis going into her final event; LOCOG’s Games were the final act in seven years of hard work by a variety of organisations. Early success was already in the bag. Great sustainable infrastructure, venues and a wonderful green park constructed by the ODA. Only venues that have a clear legacy use were designed to be permanent. The use of temporary venues has been unprecedented. Long term investment in public transport infrastructure has made Stratford one of the best connected places in Europe. The world’s first public transport Games was delivered by Transport for London and LOCOG despite all the predictions of doom and gridlock. The cheerful volunteers made the experience a joy. I even saw some people on the tube talking to each other! Why can’t it be like that all the time? LOCOG’s spectacular success in delivering a low carbon Olympic cauldron set the scene. London 2012 has demonstrated that it is possible to deliver a wonderful variety of sustainably sourced, competitively priced food and aim to dispose of the packaging with recycling and composting performance that should put the rest of the event industry to shame. Green spaces were well looked after. This was billed as …
December 1, 2011 | Posted by Jemma Percy
Tags: active travel, TFL, transport
The London 2012 Active Travel Programme was launched by LOCOG in October 2011. The Commission is pleased to see a comprehensive set of walking and cycling routes available for Londoners and visitors to use in the lead up to Games-time, during the Games and after the Games are over. We are satisfied that there are adequate plans for bike parking at the Olympic Park and that all reasonable efforts have been made to enable people to reach venues by walking and cycling wherever possible. The London 2012 Active Travel website adequately signposts people to other information sources including a map of private bike hire venues and to the Transport for London Active Travel website. The Commission has previously noted that spectators travelling to the Games will be allocated free public transport and that this principle should be extended to spectators wishing to hire cycles.[i] We have now been advised that this would be logistically very costly and therefore is not a practical solution. However, we note that the Mayor’s cycle hire scheme is already free of charge for the first 30 minutes, after an initial fee is paid for access to the scheme of £1 per day. We understand that the majority of casual users …
