"Change Your World" Encourages Alternatives to Car
by Sami Grover, Carrboro, NC, USA 
on 06.25.08
New Campaign Aims for 10% Traffic Reduction
TreeHugger is all about liveable streets – from Manhattan’s recent announcement of a temporary car-free zone to Bogota’s extensive work to create pedestrian and bike-friendly infrastructure, there are tentative signs of a worldwide movement away from the motorcar and towards alternatives. A new campaign from UK cycling charity Sustrans aims to further encourage that trend. Change Your World, which runs from the 30th of June to the 5th of July, is asking participants to take at least one journey by bike, walking, public transport or car-sharing. The campaigns organizers point out that it doesn’t take much to create a huge difference – if everyone took one less car journey a week we would see a 10% reduction in traffic. There are prizes to be won for those who take part, and a message will also be sent to Prime Minister Gordon Brown, showing just how much support there is for saner transport policies. This from the campaign’s website:
“Do you remember being free range as a kid? Playing outside and getting around under your own steam? It seems kids today are missing out and the huge amount of traffic on our streets is partly to blame.
It doesn’t have to be like this. By taking small steps together we can make a big change happen. All we’re asking is that you swap just one car trip between 30 June - 5 July and walk, cycle, use public transport or car-share instead. Amazingly, if we all drove just one less journey a week, together we’d reduce car traffic by 10%.”
More on Liveable Streets
Manhattan to Enjoy 6.9 Mile Temporary Car-Free Route
Streets Are For People: The Petition
Melbourne: A Pedestrian’s Paradise
Some Cities Try to be Bike Friendly
::Change Your World::via Sustrans::
Follow @TreeHugger on Twitter & get our headlines with @TH_rss!
Thirsty for more? Check out these related articles:
- Track Buses by Phone, Internet, Bus Stop
- Spare Yourself from Road Raging Bike Haters: How to Avoid Anti-Cyclism
- Green Glossary: Planet Bike
- Enter Inhabitat's Pimp My Eco-Ride Contest, Score a Shiny, New Strida
- What is the Cheapest and Greenest Way to Travel?
- Trust Stella McCartney: Meat-Free Mondays are Hip, not Hippie!
I have an idea for new york they should pick one avenue and one street down the middle of the city and creat a walking street only...rip up the street put soil down and create a giant walking path...and a seperate bicycle path of course have trees and gardens and grass the whole way down...i really think that would work and then they can start from there and start doing the same to every say 6th or 7th street and ave... what does everyoe think about that
I am 21 and was never allowed to go anywhere without being driven. Heck, if I was at the mall I wasn't supposed to walk to the next shopping center over... so no, I don't remember moving around under my own steam as a kid.
But I'm in college now, and I walk, bike, or take public transit everywhere and I love it. So much easier, and so much less time wasted.
Sounds like Anthony and I had the same (type of) parents. I grew up in the 'burbs of Memphis, TN, arguably some of the worst in America, and I turned into a car-free, biking, car-pooling, walking, skateboarding enviro-menace. Maybe it took being raised the wrong way to see the glory in using by body and wits (sometimes it's hard to understand those bus schedules!) to move myself around. Cheers to the car-freers!
Ban Cars. Move to a city and demand public transit.
This may be a good idea, but that website is the most awful thing I have ever witnessed. . . the sounds were really annoying and the well-disguised mute button for the site did not respond to my clicks.