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Community Spotlight

Tulsa Takes a Seat to Stand Up for Cleaner Air

In Tulsa, Oklahoma, even routine tasks—waiting for the bus or cruising to work—have been turned into an air quality learning experience. The credit goes to the Tulsa Area Clean Cities Coalition, an It All Adds Up to Cleaner Air Community Partner since 2002, which found some creative, inexpensive ways to reach out and inspire 74% of Tulsa residents to take simple steps that clean the air and reduce traffic congestion.

With help from It All Adds Up, some resourceful thinking, and an enticing freebie, Tulsa is starting to break through their biggest challenge—convincing commuters to share a ride or take mass transit to work.

"Our biggest targets right now are commuters and finding ways to change their attitudes about how they get to and from work," said Rachel Kelley, alternative transportation program manager of Tulsa Area Clean Cities, the air quality arm of Oklahoma's Indian Council of Governments (INCOG). "We know that changing drive-alone habits is one of the hardest tips to follow... I think we've all just gotten too comfortable and used to our vehicle being our personal space. Commuters tell us they really value that time alone in their cars."

Go ahead—tempt me!

On the other hand, give drivers something that's free and useful and you have a shot at changing their minds. "Offering an incentive can create an opening with people," Rachel said. "The trick, of course, is finding an incentive that's both enticing and inexpensive."

Rachel said the biggest success Tulsa is having right now is increasing carpools through its Tulsa Area RideShare program, which really took off once the team started giving away complimentary gas cards to new enrollees. When the program started three years ago, to spark interest Rachel realized she'd have to dangle the biggest carrot she could afford from her modest $1,000 promotion budget (funded by the U.S. Departments of Energy and Commerce). She bought 25 gas cards valued at $40 each and gave them to the first 25 people to sign up as carpool leaders.

The cards went fast.

"It's the best $1,000 I've ever spent," Rachel said. The following year she decided to lower the dollar value of each card to $25 so she could buy more cards and lure more people—and it worked. "For 2006 the gas cards were available until June, but I've already given all of them away, which is great—that means we've got 40 new carpools this year!" Meanwhile, Rachel promoted the air quality benefits of carpooling using an It All Adds Up alternate-modes radio ad.

New carpool riders also receive carpooling literature featuring clean air facts and the curvy blue tagline that reminds them that It All Adds Up to Cleaner Air. "We put the tagline on as many items as possible, including the RideShare Web site. The tagline is a major part of our campaign because it really covers it all," Rachel enthused. "We've found that people don't always make the connection between commuting choices and their impact on air quality, and the tagline helps us reinforce the idea. Plus, our Tulsa Area Clean Cities, Tulsa Area RideShare, and Ozone Alert! programs do just that—they all add up to cleaner air."

Sitting pretty

Another easy, inexpensive way Tulsa spread the word about carpooling was by placing the It All Adds Up to Cleaner Air tagline and auto icon, along with the phrase "Carpooling saves money and the air," on the backrests of public benches. "The bench project was very easy to do; all I did was download what I needed from ItAllAddsUp.gov, put my logo on it, and sent it over to the transit advertising manager," Rachel explained.

The bench ads immediately turned heads. The transit advertising manager contacted Rachel about a month later to share his good news. "He called to tell me he had sold more advertising space simply because of the high quality and look of that ad... I said I didn't do it, I just put my logo on it!"

But that's not all. Inspired by a photograph of a Miami-Dade bus painted with the It All Adds Up to Cleaner Air tagline and messages, which she spotted in a transportation magazine, Rachel wondered if it could be done in Tulsa. As it turned out, all she had to do was send the It All Adds Up artwork to the transit advertising manager and pay a small fee for labor and the advertising was hers, for free, for an entire year. Now she had a traveling billboard to tout the benefits of taking alternate modes of transportation.

"What I really love about the It All Adds Up materials is that they save me so much time and money. I don't have to sit and think about what I want to say or where to search for accurate facts or nice graphics," Rachel said. "People in the community commented on that bus throughout the campaign—it was beautiful!"

Michael Lemery from Transit Advertising in Tulsa said the It All Adds Up campaign has been a big hit. "The campaign is successful because they keep their message simple and the colors are bold," he said. "The 'rolling billboard' was on the streets only two weeks before I received the first call from a potential advertiser who had seen it."

Lemery explained that the bus ran on a different route everyday to reach maximum viewers, and the benches were positioned on streets that had the busiest intersections. "The bus and bench ads worked together to achieve maximum awareness and got an average of 246,000 daily impressions. They had permanent visibility, 24/7—we even parked the bus at the entrances to many of our most visited points of interest, including malls, sporting events, college campuses, etc."

And the survey says...

Rachel reports a "huge increase in RideShare activity" as a result of their marketing efforts. The number of carpoolers enrolled today has more than tripled since 2003. Still, there's plenty more to be done to increase interest in the RideShare program.

According to a recent public awareness survey, which they conducted with help from a research firm, many people are still reluctant to give carpooling a try. And that hesitation is exactly where Rachel and her team will focus their energy in the next phase of the awareness program. "The survey showed us that people view carpooling as inconvenient, specifically. That points the way to what we need to focus on next: how our approach makes carpooling a convenient choice. If you only want to carpool with a female from your office, or you only want to carpool twice a week, we'll include those terms in our database. So, I think what we need to do when we market the RideShare program is to make that known, make that very clear."

The public awareness survey also gave Tulsa some information worth celebrating. Today 78% of Tulsa residents are able to answer open-ended questions about what they can do to reduce air pollution and congestion. (This is a very high percentage, because respondents are asked to provide their own answer, not choose from a list.) And 74% now practice at least one simple step. For example, in 2006, 44% say they gas their vehicles in the evening, (up from 32% in 2003); 46% stop at the click; and 63% avoid mowing their lawn on Ozone Alert! Days.

"The Tulsa area is becoming a very proactive region," Rachel said, adding that her organization also plans an aggressive marketing initiative for Bike-to-Work Week, which is coming up in May again. "We're all trying to do everything we can to keep our city a Clean Air City!"

For more information about Tulsa Area Clean Cities, Tulsa Area RideShare, and Ozone Alert!, please visit the INCOG Web site at http://www.incog.org/ or contact Rachel Kelley at rkelley@incog.org.