London Marathon Events deploys ‘You. Smart. Thing.’ technology to Move Towards a Cleaner Future
We’re delighted to share the recent London Marathon Events (LME) newsletter which was written six months after LME’s innovative event for the mass participation industry earlier this year: ‘A Marathon Challenge: A Mass Movement Towards a Cleaner Future’.
The event challenged attendees from around the globe to imagine the future they want, both generally and for mass participation sport, and to think about their role in creating that future. Post-event, LME asked attendees to share ideas, thoughts and pledges and to consider how and with whom they could collaborate to bring about a cleaner, inspiring future. LME did the same.
Here is the newsletter from Kate Chapman, Head of Sustainability at LME, where she shared the collaboration with ‘You. Smart. Thing.’ (YST). We are proud to have received such a warm shout out and to be working collaboratively with LME to make a positive change. LME hopes this collaboration will inspire others to share actions, collaborations or progress that had been achieved since the ‘Marathon Challenge’ event.
Towards Lower-carbon Participant Travel
As many of you know, the biggest contributor to the carbon footprint of any mass participation sporting event is participant travel – and this is an area that is incredibly difficult for the event organiser to influence (and measure). London Marathon Events partnered with ‘You. Smart. Thing.’ to offer participants at the Vitality London 10,000 event in September 2024 a personalised travel plan that both helped them to get to the event (factoring in road closures and any public transport issues) and also nudged them towards choosing lower-carbon travel options.
We then brought in London Marathon Event’s carbon removal partner CUR8 to also offer participants the opportunity to remove the carbon emissions associated with their travel through the purchase of carbon removal credits. Carbon removal is the process of taking carbon emissions out of the earth’s atmosphere and safely storing them for hundreds to thousands of years. ‘You. Smart. Thing.’ (YST) and CUR8 worked together to develop this functionality within the travel planning tool and now the option to purchase carbon removal credits for individual travel is available to all of YST’s customers – catalysed by London Marathon Events and the Marathon Challenge event.
We had a great response from participants at the Vitality London 10,000 so we now intend to offer the YST tool at more of our events in 2025 which will help more of our participants to understand the environmental impact of their travel and enable them to reduce that impact where they can.
Kate Chapman
Head of Sustainability, LME
‘You. Smart. Thing.’ x London Marathon Events
LME is a world leading organiser of mass participation sporting events and a social purpose company. As an internationally recognised organisation, LME has the platform to encourage and work with stakeholders to protect the environment. YST reached out to introduce the LME team to our travel demand management and journey planning technology.
YST technology is designed to improve visitor experience and accessibility, nudge audience behaviour to reduce disproportionate travel-related carbon emissions, and capture valuable audience data, including CO2e emissions and modal split. The YST travel assistant service offers curated journey options, taking into consideration road closures and event-specific journey options (e.g. shuttle bus and park & ride services). By default, YST promotes the lowest carbon journey option first to encourage sustainable travel decisions.
In collaboration with LME, YST introduced a novel carbon removal integration as part of the 2024 Vitality London 10,000 travel assistant service deployment. The system calculates an individual’s travel carbon footprint using the UK government’s CO2e emissions formula, ensuring an accurate contribution based on the distance, route, and modes of travel selected.
Historically, LME has charged a Carbon Levy to London Marathon participants travelling from abroad to address travel-related carbon emissions with funds raised invested in durable carbon removal, but until now, domestic participants have not had the option to understand or address their emissions.
The YST travel assistant service deployment aligns with LME’s impressive sustainability commitments, including the aim of achieving net zero emissions by 2030.
If you are interested in learning more about LME’s sustainability commitments, check out their Environmental Impact page.
LME Vitality London 10,000 Travel Assistant (September 2024)
‘You. Smart. Thing.’ configured a travel assistant deployment for LME’s 2024 Vitality London 10,000 event to promote sustainable travel modes to all race participants.
Want to learn more about the YST/CUR8 integration?
If you’re interested in understanding more about the power of smart technology, sustainable practices and integration read our ‘Carbon-removed Event Travel‘ blog post. The YST/CUR8 integration is designed to reduce travel-related carbon emissions by nudging positive behaviour change and to facilitate the purchase of carbon removal carbon offsets to address residual emissions generated by travel.
For more information on how ‘You. Smart. Thing.‘ can help your event, visit our website or contact us directly.
