What if we all worked together to give people more options to driving? Metro is developing a $1.3-million Travel Rewards Research Pilot Project to identify and test the most effective incentives to persuade travelers to skip driving alone and instead choose transit, carpooling, walking, bicycling or telecommuting with an Accelerating Innovative Mobility (AIM) grant from the Federal Transit Administration and in-kind contributions from private technology partners and academic institutions. Among those partners are the Harvard School of Business, the Duke Center for Advanced Hindsight and private sector technology and mobility partners to identify and test the most effective incentives to persuade travelers to skip driving alone and instead choose transit, carpooling, walking, bicycling or telecommuting.

Who Are We Looking For?

Organizations that want to help reduce traffic before it starts to come back with a vengeance from the ongoing pandemic. Metro is looking for large employers, nonprofits, property owners/management companies and other large organizations to participate in the Travel Rewards Research Pilot. Eligible organizations must solicit a minimum of 1,000 employees/people to participate. Such partners would need to actively market this program to their employees or community members by email and other communications channels.

Participating employees/community members will receive rewards/incentives (funded by Metro and potentially matched by employers) to support their trial of new transportation options. Participating employers and organizations will learn critical insights from the research of Harvard and Duke researchers regarding the best way to deploy their travel demand management programs.

Rewards/incentives to drive less will be provided based on the individual’s level of participation, and will include monetary incentives in forms of direct payments, gift cards, vouchers and or commute credits, preferred parking arrangements with the employers and periodic lottery entries for a chance to win higher value items. Telecommute workflow participants will receive interventions and reminders that will help with time management, home office optimization and work-life balance.

These rewards are not meant to replace any current TDM policies of partnering employers or organizations, but rather to be provided as additional measures to change employee behavior and improve the physical and mental health — and productivity — of the working population in Los Angeles.

How Will it Work?

Participating employer and community partners will commit to working with Metro for a period of six to twelve months depending on the focus. We begin with a period of collaboration to tailor an incentive program a partner need. Partners will then work with Metro to promote the program and recruit employees or community members. Individual participants wanting to participate will be asked to sign a Participant User Agreement prior to launch. Metro will lead the study administration, while the academic partners at CAH and Harvard safely track and analyze outcomes through self-report (survey) and de-identified behavioral data.

Based on the focus workstream, participants will gain access to various Apps Metro is partnering with, which will assist in trip planning, travel, and automated trip logging to make commuting easy and seamless.

If you are interested in finding out more please contact the Travel Reward Research Pilot project managers via email at shavita@metro.net and BrooksdecamarilloJ@metro.net.