Travel boost for job seekers and students

West Yorkshire Combined Authority (WYCA) has secured £590K from the Department for Transport’s (DfT) Local Sustainable Transport Fund which means that the JobCentre Plus and go:cycling projects can be extended.

Around 9,000 jobseekers and new starters have received support with travel through the scheme which has involved the WYCA’s Travel Plan Network working with all 23 JobCentre Plus offices in West Yorkshire.

The scheme has provided almost 3,000 West Yorkshire people with a bus tickets to travel to job interviews, and almost 6,000 people have been provided with a MetroCard to travel to their workplace for their first month of work.

go:cycling has provided free adult cycle training, bike maintenance sessions, information and advice to over 20,000 people.

A joint approach with JobCentre Plus, the go:cycling team and cycling providers in West Yorkshire has seen reconditioned bikes high-viz vests, helmets, lights, bike locks and training provided to people who would otherwise be unable to access jobs via public transport. Thirty-nine bikes were supplied to people in the Calderdale, Kirklees and Wakefield districts between September 2012 and December 2013.

Welcoming the funding, West Yorkshire Combined Authority Chairman Coun Peter Box said: “Connecting people with job opportunities is vital, which is why it is so important that the ongoing discussions with government are resolved and we have the powers to make our own decisions about how the local transport network is developed and funded.”

Coun James Lewis, chairman of the Combined Authority’s Transport Committee, said “Feedback has shown that as many as 30 per cent of the project’s respondents wouldn’t have been able to accept the job without the help of the free MetroCard and that almost 90 per cent of participants are still employed.

“Over 97 per cent of those people are still using public transport to travel to work, of which 69 per cent are buying weekly or monthly tickets.”