Transform’s 2025: Wrapped

With an eventful year drawing to a close, join us as we reflect on our best moments, month by month. 

📌 Getting ScotRail on the right track | January

At the start of the year, we reported on ScotRail’s nationalisation, three years on. In The Herald we argued that despite commendable progress on electrification, political motivations and optics may have taken precedence over passengers on Scotland’s railways.

Read our commentary here.

📌 Thinking Rail First with LNER | February

In February, we were delighted to host a joint reception in the Scottish Parliament with LNER, celebrating 200 years of the railway and its role in connecting communities, cutting emissions and supporting tourism and local economies. We welcomed a diverse guest list, including MSPs, businesses, tourism interests, community organisations, senior figures from across the rail industry, and special guest Eleanor. Find out more about the event here.

📌 Celebrating 10 years of Transform Creative | March

This March, we celebrated the 10th anniversary of our award-winning social enterprise Transform Creative, Scotland’s specialist design agency for projects with a social or environmental mission. Over the years, our creative experts have worked with a range of clients – from the National Trust for Scotland to Glasgow City Council – on projects which design to make a difference.

Find out more about the Transform Creative’s work here or get to know our team in our anniversary Q&A here.

​​

📌 Prioritising bus priority | April

In April, we launched our Life in the Bus Lane report which called for the Government to reinstate funding for new bus lanes, gates and signals which give public transport users priority over private cars. The report presented the findings we gathered directly from both bus users and drivers across the country about the reality of bus travel, from Edinburgh to Aberdeen. Ahead of the launch, we brought together operators, RTPs and civil servants for a national conversation to discuss the findings and what’s needed to boost bus services.

Read more about the project here.

📌 Walking campaign success | May

In May, we were thrilled to have our national walking campaign ‘A Wee Walk Works Wonders’ shortlisted for not one but three awards. Through our campaign, we wanted to catch people’s attention, to make them stop and consider if they really needed to drive for short journeys. Ultimately, we wanted people to leave their car at home and make short journeys on foot instead. 

Read more about the campaign’s success here.

📌 Tackling transport inequalities | June

This June we published the Mind the Gap report on behalf of the Cross Party Group on Sustainable Transport, which concluded the Scottish Parliament inquiry into inequalities in Scotland’s transport system. The 12-month inquiry heard from witnesses including The Poverty Alliance, Scottish Youth Parliament, Disability Equality Scotland and the Scottish Women’s Budget Group and revealed that Scotland’s transport system is systematically excluding many Scots — especially women, disabled people, children, and those on low incomes.

Read the Group’s recommendations for a fairer transport system in its Mind the Gap report here.

📌 Influencing the Holyrood elections | July

This summer we headed to Stirling to bring together our network as we look ahead to the 2026 Scottish Parliament election. Over 50 of our members and supporters attended our election-themed network briefing where we checked the pulse on party positions on transport, and discussed collaborations and methods of influencing party manifestos.

Read our recap of the event here.

📌 Launching ‘Why Fly?’ | August

This August we launched ‘Why Fly?’ – a new website which communicates the need to shift travel between Scotland’s Central Belt and London from air to rail. Focussed on Scotland’s public bodies and businesses, the site makes the case that switching to rail for cross-border trips is one of the simplest, most high-impact actions businesses can take – cutting carbon, supporting local jobs, and keeping more money in Scotland.

Read more or view the Why Fly site here.

📌 Carspreading: a new challenge in our cities | September

In September, we were raising awareness of the carspreading phenomenon in Edinburgh, speaking with locals about the perceptions and experiences of the rise of SUVs. We hosted a billboard on Leith Walk and collaborated with Clean Cities to highlight recent YouGov data which revealed that the majority of Scots agree that these larger cars are status symbols which don’t belong in our towns and cities.

Read more here.

📌 Delivering the goods | October

This autumn the Sustainable Transport CPG turned its attention to freight: exploring smarter, cleaner, and more efficient ways of moving goods in, around, and out of Scotland. The series of meetings freight kicked off on 1 October with a focus on decarbonising last-mile and local deliveries, with guest speakers from the Royal Mail and Grid Smarter Cities. The subsequent session on cross-border freight featured Highland Spring and Transport & Environment.

Catch up on the latest with the CPG here.

📌 Love My Bus goes back to school | November

This autumn our Love My Bus Youth Programme returned to schools in the Tayside region. Love My Bus is delivered by experienced facilitators and is designed to engage, educate, and inspire young people to choose buses and active travel as their everyday transport choice. To date, the programme has:

• reached 10,000+ students in 22 local authority areas
• delivered 200 hands-on learning experiences, and
• partnered with nine major bus operators – including Stagecoach, McGill’s, First, and Lothian.

Read more here.

📌 Bringing our network together | December

In the final quarter of 2025 we’ve been bringing the sector together for a new 3-part series of Network Briefings. The online events spotlighted the latest in ferries, rail and bus – with speakers from CalMac, ScotRail, Citylink and more. Each session included updates from the Transform team on the latest in Scottish transport policy, insights from expert speakers, Q&A and speed networking. We look forward to hosting more briefings in 2026.