Turn It Off: An Anti-idling Campaign

BACKGROUND:

Each day millions of motorists unnecessarily idle their vehicle engines. It is estimated that
Canadians idle their vehicles an average of 5 to 10 mins everyday and that at any given time 56% of
Canadian motorist are idling their engines when parked and sitting in their vehicles. Natural Resources
of Canada (NRCan) reports that if motorist reduced their idling by five minutes per day, Canadians would
reduce their annual carbon monoxide emissions by over 1 million tons and over Can$ 1.7 million would
be saved every day.

PROJECT OBJECTIVE:
1. Examine ways to reduce engine idling by members of the public while they wait in their vehicles
2. Increase community awareness of the importance of reducing green gas emissions from
individual actions, such as engine idling
3. Develop knowledge and expertise in the use of the innovative approaches of community-based
social marketing
4. Promote voluntary compliance with the City of Torontos’ Idling Control By-Law
5. Provide the foundation for future community based programs to address engine idling

This Community Based Social Marketing is based on 5 steps;

1. Carefully selecting the behavior to be targeted

2. Identifying the barriers and benefits to the action
3. Developing a strategy to overcome the barriers and enhance the perceived benefits
4. Piloting the strategies
5. Implementing on a broad scale

STRATEGIES:

1. Approaching motorist and speaking with them the importance of turning off their vehicle
engines when parked, approached motorist were provided with an information card that
indicated that reducing idling would save money, reduce air pollution and decrease greenhouse
emissions.

2. Signs reminding motorist to turn off their engines while waiting were posted at both the school
and kiss and ride site

3. As part of the conversation, each motorist was asked to make a commitment to turn off their
engines, they were asked to place a sticker on their front windshield

CONDITIONS:

1. Two kiss and ride sites (designated drop off and pick-up zone) and two school received none of
the above materials, they serve as controls
2. Two kiss and ride site and two schools received only the signs
 3. The personal conversation, which involved providing an information card and the sticker were
used in conjunction with the signs

RESULT:
1. The signs alone, which is what most municipalities would gravitate towards using, were
completely ineffective.
2. Motorist in the sign only condition was no more likely to turn off their engines than those in the
control group
3. The combination of signs, stickers and the information card dramatically affected idling, 32%
reduction in engine idling and over 70% reduction in the duration of idling based on over 8,000
observation of vehicles in various parking lots.

This pilot project was subsequently implemented across two Canadian cities, Mississauga and Sudbury,
with similar result. The materials from the project was freely available to communities so that they can
quickly and inexpensively implement their own anti-idling campaigns. As a consequence, municipalities
across North America have implemented anti-idling programs based on this case study.

IN SUMMARY:

A successful anti-idling campaign can serve as a catalyst for public involvement in the reduction
of greenhouse gas emissions. Idling is ubiquitous. Its prevalence provides an opportunity to engage
people in an activity that has direct relationship to climate change and air quality. This project clearly
demonstrated that this behavior can be quickly and cost-effectively altered through the use of
community-based social marketing approach. It is possible to change the behavior of people and to use
this behavioral change as a foundation for learning about climate change and the role that we each can
play in its abatement.

(Source: Natural Resources of Canada Website www.nrcan.gc.ca)