16,000 on the move in Stirling community effort

More than 16,000 City of Stirling residents have now joined Your Move Stirling and received personalised tools and coaching to help them walk, ride and catch public transport more often. This milestone makes Your Move Stirling the largest travel behaviour change program delivered by the Department of Transport (DoT).

The Department of Transport’s Executive Director Justin McKirdy said DoT and project partners the City of Stirling were thrilled to see so many residents embrace the program, which aims to get people driving less and moving more.

“With a high rate of car dependency, good access to public transport and the new $19 million Principal Shared Path between Glendalough Station and Hutton Street, we knew there was huge potential for the project and this was reflected in our ambitious goal to work with 16,000 residents,” Mr McKirdy said.

“Small changes to the way we move like walking the kids to school or riding down to the local shops instead of driving can add up to big benefits for our health, our transport network and our environment.

“When you have 16,000 people all making those small changes together, it really starts to add up and I am excited for the City of Stirling community to start to feel the positive impact of their changes.”

In addition to working one-on-one with residents, the Your Move Stirling team also engaged eight schools and three workplaces in the City.

Schools throughout Stirling became hubs for engaging the wider community, with students participating in bike education, footpath stencil painting and fun-filled Active Travel Festival events. An inter-school competition encouraged families from participating schools to register with Your Move Stirling. Scarborough Primary School was victorious, with 56 per cent of parents participating in the project.

In March, employees from IKEA Perth, the City of Stirling and DoT’s Innaloo office battled it out in the Your Move Cup to see which workplace was the most active in travelling to and from work. Almost 100 people from across the three organisations participated by logging their daily trip to work and earning points for walking, bike riding and using public transport. DoT took out the friendly competition, but they weren’t the only winners, with more than a third of those who took part pledging to continue using active transport to get to work.

Another way Your Move Stirling is encouraging people to walk, ride or use public transport as an alternative to driving is through the installation of 300 fun and colourful wayfinding signs. The ground-based signs, funded through the program, are located in local neighbourhoods all over the City of Stirling and promote active travel to its many local businesses, beaches, parks and sporting facilities.

City of Stirling Mayor Mark Irwin said he was pleased to invest in the wayfinding signage, which includes 50 bike safety signs, as part of the Your Move Stirling project. 

“I am confident that these eye-catching signs will not only help the 16,000 people taking part in Your Move Stirling to stay on track with their active transport goals in the longer term but also encourage the wider community to walk, ride or use public transport more,” Mr Irwin said. 

For more information about how Your Move Stirling please visit the Your Move website.  

Media contact: media@transport.wa.gov.au

Image: Your Move’s David Paddon with Scarborough Primary School Principal Sarah Dawson and students Bradley, Ayla and Cobie.