Talk to your employer about changing your start and finish times so that you can travel on public transport when it isn’t so busy. If you’re the boss, think about whether you really need all your staff to start work at the same time and especially at the same time as all the other workplaces in that area. If not, institute staggered schedules for your employees. The Government’s business advice service Business Link gives information on how to bring flexible working patterns into your business.

If you don’t have reasonable access to public transport from where you live think about driving to the nearest train station or bus stop and leaving your car there. Or, consider the possibility of moving closer to where you work. If that’s a realistic option you can then walk or cycle.

Changing your travelling to work habits is beneficial to the environment, your peace of mind, and your wallet. The relative cost savings can be substantial. A non-car user who uses a combination of public transport and taxis over the year, with the odd hire-car thrown in, usually runs up lower bills than someone who buys and runs a car, with its insurance, fuel, and maintenance costs. Imagine the costs for families with two or more cars per family.

If you have to use your car, find out whether you can share driving with someone else travelling the same or a similar route – check the previous section ‘Sharing the driving – and the car!’ for advice. People park at a pre- agreed location and are picked up by colleagues for the rest of the journey. Informal arrangements like this have led many local authorities to provide official park and share areas. You can make a difference.

These legs were made for walking (and pedalling)

The reality is that many people live too far from their work to walk all the way. Or do they? An increasing trend in many cities around the world is for people to live close to their workplace and social attractions, so they walk to work via the many shops and services that exist in inner urban areas.

If the walk to work is too far, walking to a nearby train or bus stop is a much healthier and less expensive transport option than driving.

Cycling is also becoming an increasingly popular mode of transport – largely as a result of many cities and towns investing in good, safe, and direct cycling paths that don’t compete with other traffic. In some cases, using a bicycle to get to work may be quicker than dealing with traffic congestion.

The key to cycling to and from work is doing the necessary planning:

• Make sure that your workplace has good cycle parking and locker facilities, ensuring your peace of mind that no one is going to cycle off with your treasured transport investment.
• Check that you have accessible showering and changing facilities. If there are no washing facilities at your workplace talk to your boss about the possibility of making them available and why you think they’d make a difference to the work environment as well as the wider environment. Many employers just haven’t considered washing facilities a necessity because no one has ever brought up the subject.
• Research the route you use – look for roads or paths that are well surfaced and wide enough to avoid conflicts with other vehicles.

If you’ve done all that then what are you waiting for – on your bike!

If you take up cycling to become a greener traveller, don’t forget to stay safe. Make sure you have good lights on the bike and wear a helmet, highly visible clothing, and reflecting bands. Motorists need to be able to see you easily in the dark or in poor visibility.

About two-thirds of people in the UK live within cycling distance of a train station but very few of those get to work by train because facilities for bikes at stations and on trains are scarce. Some train operating companies are very strict about the number, size, and type of bike they allow on board and some allow them only on particular trains, if at all. Check out the situation before you travel and lobby hard for more facilities for bikes at stations and on trains.

Being green doesn‘t always involve spending money. It can be about putting good ideas into practice and about helping other people by behaving ethically.

Freecycling

Freecycling is about getting rid of stuff you don’t want and giving it away for free to someone who does want it. You can freecycle just about anything — clothes and shoes, handbags, electrical goods, furniture. Of course, you can make money selling on Internet auction Web sites but freecycling is a greener alternative. And, as well as offering your white elephants to others, you can pick up things you want that others are giving away free.

Schemes like this cut down on the number of new goods that people buy and the amount of energy that goes into their production.

As a bonus, giving away what you no longer want makes you feel good and you’re doing your bit to stop the landfill sites filling up.

Buying Organic Vegetable Boxes

Buying locally grown, organically produced food is the greenest way to eat. Later I will explain that local food travels short distances and if it’s organic very few if any chemicals are used to grow it. Most areas have Organic Vegetable Box schemes so there’s likely to be one near you.

Some schemes deliver only locally grown produce so you get what’s in season and you may not have as much variety as you’d like. Other schemes include some imported organic food so you have better variety, but the food has to travel long distances so it isn’t as green.

Check out and compare the schemes carefully before deciding which to sign up to.

You can get more information about these schemes from the Soil Association, which is the main organisation in the UK for certifying produce as organic.

The supermarkets are also offering box schemes but the produce they deliver is likely to include a higher percentage of imported products, plus they’re competing with local farmers. Buy directly from a local farmer if you can.

Eating with Your Children

If your children are involved in shopping for food and cooking it, they have much more of an idea where it’s come from and what’s good and bad for them. Take them to visit local farms or city farms that have open days so they understand the link between food and the countryside. If they’re used to eating fresh foods, including fruit and vegetables, they’re less likely to develop a taste for processed food.

Buying Fairtrade Goods

Fairtrade is a trading scheme that works to make sure that producers in the developing world get equitable prices for their products, and that workers have reasonable working conditions and fair terms of trade with the firms they supply.

Shops and supermarkets carry an ever-expanding range of Fairtrade goods – around 300 at the time of writing – including tea, coffee, chocolate, bananas, herbs and spices, flowers, cotton, and footballs, and the list is growing as the scheme extends its reach.

Shopping for Green Gadgets

There are thousands of green gadgets on sale. More and more companies are getting in on the green revolution – coming up with new ideas every day. Just a few you may be interested in are:

• Pouches for your cigarette butts and used chewing gum while you’re out of reach of litter bins. Litter is not just antisocial but cost councils a fortune to clean up. Cigarettes butts don’t degrade. At best they just cause unsightly litter; at worst they start forest fires. Chewing gum is notoriously difficult to get off the pavement, or your shoes and clothes if you happen to stick to it.
• Solar powered or wind-up chargers for your mobile phone and iPod. These used to be the preserve of hill walkers and mountaineers but they’re more widely available now. You can get them from specialist shops for walkers or over the Internet. Type ’solar mobile phone charger’ into a search engine and all sorts of retailers will pop up.
• Bio-degradable mobile phones are one of the latest inventions. They’re made from bio-degradable plastic and have a sunflower seed in their innards. When you’ve finished with your phone, you compost it and a sunflower grows. Look out for them reaching the shops.