UC is a member of SmartTravel, a local government-supported car pooling website offering a fee and secure service to help you find car pool matches.
By joining SmartTravel, you access the largest secure carpooling database in Christchurch. SmartTravel is easy to join and find matches with others who share a similar journey. You can also use this database for one-off journeys outside of the Ōtautahi-Christchurch and Waitaha-Canterbury region - even across the whole country! When you register choose University of Canterbury as your employer (for staff) or college for students.
If you have any questions or need any help email letscarpool@ccc.govt.nz.
Reasons to carpool
Carpooling to work has a lot of benefits. First widely used in the oil-shock 70's, carpooling is back as a social and practical way to reduce costs and emissions when travelling by car.
It helps your environment, your economy, your community, and even better it helps you personally to enjoy your commute, travel faster, easier, and save thousands of dollars every year. Want to know more? Here are eight great reasons to give carpooling a go!
1. Save money on petrol
No one likes to pay for petrol. If you share your petrol bill with just one passenger, then you'll save 50%. That’s a 50% saving on your petrol bill, every time you fill up.
2. Save money on parking, maintenance, insurance
You car costs you more than just petrol. You also pay for parking, tolls, insurance, repairs, maintenance and even worse your car will eventually depreciate until it's worthless. If you carpool you can reduce all of these costs too.
3. De-stress
Driving can be stressful. It requires your concentration for hours at a time, but if you carpool then you don't have to drive as often. A University of California study shows you are likely to have lower blood pressure if you carpool: That's a fact!
4. Do more with your time
Driving every day is a waste of your time. Wouldn't you rather be enjoying a conversation, or reading a book? If you carpool you will have more time for those things that you'd rather be doing: You can do them from the passenger seat.
5. Get to know your workmates
Setting up a carpool can help you meet your workmates. You get to meet and talk with other great people from your team, every day. You can turn down that radio and bring a little fun and conversation to your morning drive.
6. Make our community more livable
More cars mean more congestion, and fewer car parks for everyone. It means more traffic noise and pollution around our area. If you carpool then you're helping to improve our community for everyone, including yourself.
7. Support our local economy
90% of the money you spend on petrol goes off shore. Why not support local businesses instead? If you save money by carpooling, you will have more money to spend locally to support the people and area you care about.
8. Support our environment
For most people driving is the single biggest contributor to their carbon footprint. This means that cutting down on driving is the biggest action you can take to make your life more sustainable. If your carpool has one passenger, in an average car, on an average commute, you'll avoid 3.2 tonnes of CO2 emissions every year! Carpooling can make a real difference.
