GO Group recognizes major cities for being green

In celebration of Earth Day, April 22, The GO Group, LLC, the world’s largest airport ground transportation provider, is paying tribute to the earth-friendly efforts of some of the largest cities it serves.

Among the cities cited for their green initiatives are: Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles, New York, Paris and San Francisco.

“As a green-conscious company, GO is proud to be associated with these metropolitan centers that are leading the way to a cleaner environment,” said John McCarthy, president of The GO Group.

Chicago was cited as a pioneer of roof-top gardens, which improve air quality, conserve energy, reduce the urban heat island effect and serve as building insulation. The city currently has more than 2.5 million square feet of city roofscapes, including those installed at City Hall, Chicago O’Hare International Airport and Soldier Field. Another 250 public and private green roofs – totaling more than 1 million square feet – are in design or under construction.

Denver’s Stapleton Development Plan has made “sustainability” a guiding principle of development at Stapleton International Airport, which among other accomplishments, has resulted in six million tons of concrete and 200,000 tons of asphalt from airport parking lots, commuter runways and aprons being turned into aggregate and used in construction projects around the city.

Los Angeles manages a comprehensive recycling program that annually collects more than 240,000 tons of recyclables and 480,000 tons of yard trimmings. The city offers curbside collections for everyday recyclables and mobile drop-off centers for a variety of toxic materials.

MillionTreesNYC is New York’s citywide, public-private initiative, with an ambitious goal of planting and caring for one million new trees across the city’s five boroughs over the next decade.

Paris committed itself to reducing total emissions in 2050 by 75 percent of 2004 levels. One way the city plans to attain this goal is by replacing its existing municipal fleet with hybrid and natural gas-powered vehicles. It also discourages private car usage in favor of public transportation, car pooling, shared-ride services, self-service bicycle hires, among other initiatives.

San Francisco was the first large city in the United States to collect food scraps for composting. Today, hundreds of thousands of residents and about 2,000 businesses send more than 300 tons of material each day to a composting facility. Food scraps, plant trimmings, soiled paper and other compostables are turned into nutrient-rich soil.

“The GO Group salutes these cities as well as its own member companies for their contributions to protecting the environment,” says McCarthy, adding, “A shared ride is a green ride. With six people on board, a van uses only 30 percent of the fuel that six cars would use and creates 54 percent fewer carbon emissions.”

The GO Group launched in August 2007 as a convenient, one-stop source for door-to-door airport shuttle services. Each year, its members transport nearly 29 million passengers to 110 airports around the world using a fleet of nearly 4,000 vehicles. Travelers can easily book ground transportation to and from both departure and destination airports through GO’s Web site, www.goairportshuttle.com/.