Every week is Healthy Commute Week By: greening homes

One of our core pillars is smart transportation to and from the job site. Rather than fill up the streets with trucks, our crew walk from the nearest TTC stop or lock up their bicycles. Managers drive an electric smart car to travel from site to site.

So deciding to participate in Pollution Probe’s Healthy Commute Week from June 1 to 5 was a no-brainer.

While participating hardly changed our behaviour – although some managers opted to bike or carpool –   it helped us clock just how much we travel using green alternatives to the combustible engine, and how much carbon emissions we tend to avoid.

Collectively, during the first five days in June, Greening Homes managers and crew travelled 558 km, mostly by bike. One employee took transit and another shared a ride. We saved 43.7 liters of fuel and avoided 95.39 kg of greenhouse gases!

Christopher Phillips and Steven Gray, our respective President and Construction Manager, took part too – while in Vancouver at the National Conference of the Canada Green Building Council. Christopher actually brought his fold up bicycle with him!

Pollution Probe took notice in our efforts, presenting us with the ‘Highest Participating Rate’ Award at its June 23 ceremony. According to Pollution Probe, Healthy Commute Week engaged 45 workplaces and 350 participants that collectively travelled 53,127 km, saved 3,378 liters of fuel and avoided 6,719 kg of CO2 emissions!

The results are thrilling and make us wonder: what if all work places formalized a smart transportation policy too making every week a healthy commute one? Imagine the impact on our health and planet!