Movin'Records
We've counted over 1 million walking and wheeling trips to school! Will you be part of the next million trips?
Quick history of Movin'March
History
Movin'March started way back in 2009 or 2010 (so long ago that there is no written record!). It was a one week event in a handful of schools. By 2016 it became a month long event and 60 schools (30%) across the region took part. That included about 14,000 students and they submitted over 19,530 trips on their passport cards (not all schools sent these in).
Since then, Movin'March has continued to grow; since 2019 between 125 and 140 schools have taken part each year (63-70% of all primary schools).
Today
In 2025, we reached a total of over 1,000,000* WoW Passport card trips counted! That's a million walking and wheeling trips made by the awesome tamariki of Te Upoko o te Ika a Māui in the past 9 years. Ka rawe!
(* This includes only cards returned to GW by the competition deadlines since 2016)
More background
Waka Kotahi NZTA estimates the health benefits of walking (for 'new users') at $4.40 per km! Cycling comes in at $2.20 per km travelled! (Source: NZTA, 2020open_in_newopen_in_new). With almost half of primary school students in Wellington City alone travelling more than 1km to school, this would quickly add up to amazing benefits - if we can make it fun, safe and easy for kids to walk (Molijn, 2023open_in_newopen_in_new). Because distance to school is also the strongest determinant on mode choice (Mandic, 2023open_in_newopen_in_new).
Auckland Transport has a cool worksheetopen_in_newopen_in_new showing the benefits of active travel as part of their Let's go thereopen_in_new resource.
AT have also collected together a range of 'proof pointsopen_in_newopen_in_new' providing evidence of all the various benefits of active travel to school. This includes who it improves health, supports mental health, and helps kids learn.
In 2023/24 only around 32.4% of kids aged 5-9 used active modes to get to school (EHINZ, 2025open_in_newopen_in_new). This percentage increases slightly for tamariki aged 10-14 (44.9%), but nationally this number has been decreasing since 2011.
Our data gurus have looked at the census data from 2018 and 2023, and compared these numbers across schools that took part in Movin'March vs those who didn't. While the non-Movin'March schools followed the national trend (dropping by 3-6%), we found that our Movin'March schools not only maintained their active travel levels, but also had about 10% more active travellers to begin with!
Movin'March really is making a difference!