Transportation

Many hospitals and health systems face transportation challenges, including:

• Existing parking structures for employees and visitors are at maximum capacity and costly expansions aren’t feasible. 
• Idling ambulances and delivery trucks are wasting fuel, increasing hospital fuel costs and the overhead costs for supplies. 
• Excess emissions from idling vehicles and employee single-vehicle commuters flow into the surrounding environment, where employees, visitors, neighbors, and patients breathe them in – a huge health concern, as vehicle emissions contain particulates linked to lung damage, asthma, and low birth weight. 
• Nearly 123 million Americans live in communities with pollution levels that exceed EPA’s national air quality standards and many of whom either receive care for related chronic medical conditions at community hospitals and health systems or are employees of these systems. 

Enacting more sustainable transportation practices can lead to:

• Improved employee health, well-being, and job satisfaction 
• Drastic reductions in the number of single-occupancy cars parked on site, alleviating parking pressures, avoiding construction and maintenance costs, and freeing up space for expansion.  
• Fuel cost reductions in the hundreds of thousands of dollars each year 
• Improved air quality and benefits to the community

Not sure where to start? Read the Transportation how-to guide. 

Practice Greenhealth has developed goals, tools, and resources to help our members think through and address their vehicle emissions’ footprint step-by-step across three main vehicle categories.