Question: What’s better than doing something good for the health of the planet?

Answer: Doing it because it’s the right thing to do – and then being rewarded by winning free movie tickets or a free meal at Panera Bread, Café 4 or Tomato Head.

It’s easy. Join Smart Trips, a free online program where you win gift cards for driving less – either by carpooling, working from home or working a compressed week, riding your bike, walking or taking the bus.

Register online at www.knoxsmarttrips.org. Click “Join Now” in the top menu. Log your commutes, and soon, you’ll have enough points to be entered into drawings for $50 and $100 gift cards to Regal Cinemas, restaurants, Mast General Store, Bliss and Three Rivers Market.

Smart Trips also offers a carpool matching database, so you can find like-minded environmentally-friendly fellow commuters who happen to work a schedule similar to yours. The program even includes an Emergency Ride Home (ERH) provision, so if your bike gets a flat tire or you have to leave your workplace unexpectedly, Smart Trips will foot the bill for the cab ride home up to five times a year.

Know someone who’s cashed in on free goodies? Smart Trips posts the Commuter Rewards Winners here: http://www.knoxsmarttrips.org/winners.htm.

Maybe it doesn’t make them feel quite as gleeful as winning a free dinner or a shopping spree, but Smart Trips commuters save money every time they leave their car parked. A day’s commutes can cost $5, calculating fuel and car maintenance costs, insurance and auto depreciation.

Sign up today, and start earning your Commuter Rewards Points!