Proposal for a World Car-Free Days Programme

The following proposal was drafted by participants of the Towards Car-Free Cities III conference (Prague, March 2003) and delivered in person to the European Union and the United Nations in the days following the conference. Discussions with those two international bodies and other global partners are continuing as of early May 2003.

We, the participants of the Towards Car-Free Cities III Conference, representing over twenty countries and fifty organisations from across Eastern and Western Europe, the Americas, Africa, and Asia, hereby propose the creation of a World Car-Free Days Programme.

As members of the global car-free movement, we assembled in Prague, Czech Republic from March 17-22, 2003 to exchange knowledge, experience, and culture. Throughout the week we strategised on how to increase our effectiveness and our level of international collaboration.

As the network which initiated the first worldwide car-free day in 2000, we would now like to unite the many car-free day stakeholders and partners in a common coordinated programme, drawing upon the best practices and approaches of Europe, Latin America, and elsewhere in the world.

Of course, with this proposal goes the recognition that a car-free day should not be an occasion to criticise those who choose to drive, but should instead present a positive approach to encourage motorists to experiment with leaving their cars at home. All materials associated with the programme should be consistent with this objective.

The programme would centre around an annual World Car-Free Day on September 22, the date of the existing European Car-Free Day "In Town, Without My Car!" But due to weather differences and cultural concerns, local and national governments and organisations would be free to choose an alternative date or multiple dates and still be part of a broader World Car-Free Days Programme. This programme would provide an ongoing forum for the exchange of information, ideas and strategy on the organisation of car-free days held throughout the year.

Building on the positive results of the European Car-Free Day and the European Mobility Week, we propose to include in the General Outline the following objectives of the World Car-Free Day Programme:

  • to make World Car-Free Day a step towards the long-term goal of building car-free cities and transforming existing cities into increasingly less car-dependent and healthier environments;

  • to integrate the events and activities undertaken around the world in order to build a network of car-free cities and to provide opportunities for cooperation and joint actions of the cities worldwide;

  • to exchange experience and know-how that contribute to the global car-free movement and sustainable mobility;

  • to initiate and give a framework for the community grassroots initiatives working towards car-free cities through partnership actions of municipalities, non-governmental organizations, entrepreneurs, citizens and others;

  • to take into account the particular issues and challenges faced by countries of the Global South and Central and Eastern Europe, to ensure that all parts of the world can benefit from the car-free movement. The Southern countries are in a unique position to learn from the mistakes of the over-industrialised North and not become car-dependent; and

  • to address the overall damaging impact of automobile-based infrastructure on the health and well-being of both people and the natural world.

We would hope that, united with our growing global network, the partners of the World Car-Free Days Programme would include the European Union, the United Nations, the Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP), the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI), EcoPlan International, and many other agencies and organisations.

Signed, on behalf of the Towards Car-Free Cities III conference,

Dominika Zareba
Greenways Coordinator, Polish Environmental Partnership Foundation
and an initiator of Krakow's European Mobility Week 2002 programme
Krakow, Poland

Gabrielle Hermann
Department of Urban and Environmental Policy and Planning
Tufts University, Somerville, Massachusetts, USA

Kirsten Miller
Program Director, Ecocity Builders
Founding Member, Ecocity International
Berkeley, California, USA

Alexey L. Tcharykov
Coordinator, Car-Free Russia
Editor, Transport in Russia
Moscow, Russia

Randall H. Ghent
Co-Director, Car Busters
Conference Coordinator, Towards Car-Free Cities III
Prague, Czech Republic

Jelena Curcic
NGO "reCYCLE"
Novi Sad, Serbia and Montenegro

Milan Boric
member of the presidency
NGO Yugo Cycling Campaign (YCC)
Belgrade, Serbia and Montenegro

Piotr Bielski
Citizens' Environmental Movement
Lodz, Poland

J.H. Crawford
Author, Carfree Cities; Publisher, Carfree.com
Amsterdam, The Netherlands

Andras Lukacs
Clean Air Action Group
Budapest, Hungary

John Whitelegg
Professor of Environmental Studies, Liverpool John Moores University
Editor, Journal of World Transport Policy and Practice
Lancaster, UK

Desislava Stoyanova
Ecological Organisation "For the Earth" (Za Zemiata)
Sofia, Bulgaria

David Ceaser
Co-Founder, CarfreeCity, USA
Berkeley, California, USA