It turns out...you care!
In October 2021 we conducted a survey of 3,000 people across the UK on the nation’s feelings toward sustainable transport and the rail industry.
3 in every 5 of you feel a sense of pride to travel by train, knowing it's better for the environment.
In addition to taking the train yourselves, almost half of you act as train ambassadors, persuading your peers to choose rail over other more polluting forms of transport. Way to go, UK!
Not only are you singing the praises of trains, but a massive 82% of you would love to see rail shout more about how sustainable it is...so here we are. Get ready for some sustainable shouting.
You produce 7 times less CO2 emissions every single time you travel by train instead of by car and 20 times less CO2 than travelling by air.
Last year, Trainline was the Provider of rail travel for COP26 - the 26th UN Climate Change Conference of the Parties - and we were incredibly proud to offer the most sustainable way of travelling to such an important moment of global significance.
According to the Department for Business, Energy & Industrial Strategy, in recent years, transport has overtaken energy as the UK’s biggest offender for greenhouse gas emissions, which means our travel choices can have a bigger impact than ever before.
We asked how much exactly you thought your carbon footprint could be reduced by choosing to travel by train instead of by car. 3/5 of you thought it was between 10-30%...but only 4% knew just how positive the impact of our travel choices can be.
The real number is actually closer to 80% less carbon*.
To frame this in a different way, Trainline customers save on average over 1.5 megatons of CO2 emissions each year by using rail instead of road**. 1.5 megatons.
It doesn’t matter which way you cut it – trains are better.
And we believe the best way to travel by train is with a digital Railcard. You can get 1/3 off train tickets with a Railcard***, so no matter what your rail travel looks like, you can get busy saving carbon whilst saving money.
* European Environment Agency study (2014)
**Trainline estimates of annualised km per year rail travel on Trainline in UK (based on Jan-Sep 2019); Rail vs car per passengers KMs estimated comparisons sourced from DEFRA Greenhouse Gas Conversion Factors, 2019
***Applies to selected train fares. See Trainline's Railcard terms for full details of each Railcard, eligible tickets and travel times.