The City of Mississauga

Idling campaigns can take a variety of approaches but the one factor they all have in common is the important role played by private citizens, community groups and municipal governments. Private citizens can be instrumental in influencing change through encouraging action to reduce idling in their neighbourhoods or at their children's schools. Community groups can conduct personal intervention at local shopping malls or other community places, while municipal governments can conduct both personal intervention and broader public education campaigns.

As part of the 2002, "Towards an Idle-Free Zone in the City of Mississauga" campaign, the City of Mississauga used many communications tools to raise awareness of idling issues. Following are examples of these tools that you, your organization or your local government may find useful in implementing your own idle-free campaign.

Transit Shelter Advertisements and Posters
These large posters were used in the media campaign as transit shelter advertisements and bus tails. Smaller versions were also produced as posters and distributed as part of the school package to give the campaign additional "reach" and serve as another reminder to Mississauga motorists, particularly parents, to turn their engines off when parked.

Radio PSA text
A thirty-second radio spot on the topic of idling was developed by the City of Mississauga and broadcast on local radio stations.

Resident Telephone Survey
Here you can download the script that was used as part of the pre and post campaign telephone surveys. The data collected through these attitudinal surveys helped researchers to gain an understanding of vehicle idling behaviour, examine its frequency, and learn about the perceptions and attitudes held by Mississauga residents.

Telephone Baseline Survey Summary Report
As part of Mississauga's strong evaluation component, the resident telephone attitudinal surveys mentioned above were conducted before and after the campaign providing both baseline and post-campaign data. This allowed researchers to measure the success of each major campaign component as well as the overall project. The conclusions of the Telephone Baseline Survey Data are provided in this summary report.

Baseline and Follow-up Data Collection Record Forms
The Data Collection Record Form was used at Idling Hot Spots to keep track of the number of vehicles idling, the duration of idling for each vehicle, and the overall idling activities of motorists. Similar to the telephone surveys, data was gathered both before and after the campaign, as part of the evaluation component of the project.

Idling Intervention Forms used in Mississauga
Here you can download examples of the forms that were used to help document the effectiveness of the personal intervention conducted by project staff, as well as the feedback and comments from idling motorists.

Sample Letters to business groups, CEO's, schools, municipalities, and newspaper editors
As part of its citywide campaign, the City of Mississauga designed a letter to come from the local Board of Education illustrating its support for the campaign and encouraging its member schools to participate. These letters can give you some ideas on how you can reach members within your own community, including not only schools but also business groups, municipalities and the media.

Final Campaign Report in Mississauga
You can download Mississauga's final campaign report detailing their two year pilot project or you can read about it in more detail on their dedicated website at www.123turnyourkey.com.