Only five months into 2020, the COVID-19 global crisis has changed life as we knew it. Although at times the present resembles a work of fiction, the unprecedented effects on civilization are nothing but real.

Mobility and climate change go hand in hand as lockdowns have made it even more visible. In these areas, the unfortunate pandemic produced an unexpected, positive impact on the environment, as a result of travel bans and millions of people staying at home due to COVID-19 related restrictions.

As governments start loosening restrictions, the uncertainty on whether these changes are short-lived remains.

Effect on Air Quality

As Scripps Oceanography geochemist Ralph Keeling noted, fossil fuel use would have to decline by about 10 percent around the world and would need to be sustained for a year to show up clearly in carbon dioxide levels.

NASA satellite measurements have shown an improvement in air quality, revealing a 30% drop in air pollution of the Northeast United States as in other regions of the world.

In India´s city capital Delhi, one of the most polluted cities in the world, the levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2), which is mainly emitted during the combustion processes of fossil fuels (diesel, gasoline, coal) have decreased by 55%.

Road Safety

Since 2015, the United Nations has adopted an Agenda for Sustainable Development, in which the goal is to drive progress towards global road traffic deaths and injuries by 2030. Road traffic injuries are the leading cause of death for children and young adults aged 15-29 years. Nearly 1.3 million people are victims of road crashes every year, an additional 20-50 million are injured or disabled.

The numbers shown by the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) are an indicator of the urge for a safer transport system.

In February, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus described it as “an outrage” during his speech at the Third Global Ministerial Conference On Road Safety celebrated in Stockholm, Sweden.“It is an unacceptable price to pay for mobility,” he remarked.

How is COVID-19 influencing road safety?

Early this month, the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) convened a conversation via social media to discuss how transportation, both public and private will look like on the day after, and talk on the measures countries have taken to reduce or restrict movement in the context of the coronavirus.

IDB President Luis Alberto Moreno met virtually with a high-level panel of guests (Gloria Hutt Minister of Transport in Chile, Horacio Rodriguez Larreta Mayor of Buenos Aires, Patrick Klugman Deputy Mayor of Paris, Jean Todt UN SG´s Special Envoy for Road Safety, Amani Abou-Zeid African Union Commissioner for Infrastructure and Energy, and Felipe Massa Formula E & former Formula 1 racing driver).

Moreno started noting that motorized transportation is responsible for 37% of all CO2 emissions.

Transport accounts for 30% of global energy consumption; before the spread of the novel coronavirus began late in December 2019, the levels of the main long-lived greenhouse gases carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4), and nitrous oxide (N2O), had continued to escalate reaching new highs.

Jean Todt UN SG´s Special Envoy for Road Safety had previously addressed: “The Road Safety community has been advocating for a bigger shift to active modes of mobility over the past decades for many reasons, including addressing climate change, traffic congestion, noise pollution, and physical inactivity – many reflected in the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

“The impetus that COVID-19 is placing on installations of temporary or permanent infrastructure to facilitate more pedestrians and cyclists (to meet physical distancing recommendations), is yet another positive result of this crisis; not everything has been negative from the transport standpoint.”

Bicycle: Commonly used by transport Authorities

The bicycle is a climate-friendly, popular, affordable, efficient, and healthy mode of transport. In the last few years, cities have been introducing initiatives such as bicycle sharing systems while creating new bikeways and parking spaces to complement public transport systems and reduce the use of cars in city centers.

The COVID-19 pandemic is leading to a reinforcement of action in the use of this mode of transport with cities developing new urban plans for a safer, cleaner, mobility system that also meets the new social distancing recommendations.

“The urgent need for these active modes of mobility – to allow for physical distancing- has increased and quickened some governments’ investments in their regard. In preparation of the loosening of the lockdown planned starting from May 11th and to facilitate active mobility (rather than the use of private motorized vehicles), Paris, for example, is now accelerating towards their 2024 “Plan Vélo” goal – ultimately for every street in the city to become cycle-friendly,” Todt further explained.

Paris, France

Patrick Klugman Deputy Mayor of Paris said that the crisis is not a game-changer on the objective of reducing the pollution of the car in the city.“It was a long term goal, but this coronavirus crisis makes it a bigger emergency than ever.”

The number of Parisians using bicycles in the last two years increased by more than 150%,” according to Klugman.

“The goal is to reduce the most the place of the car for safety reasons and pollution reasons, and the bike is the first solution we are trying to promote.”

“We are doubling the lane of the subway with new bike lanes that we are prohibiting from cars.This is a very innovative solution for us, but it is something that we take from the experience of cities in Latin America.” In addition, new parking zones are being created around the city (Greater Paris) to encourage people to leave the car in the parking zones, and continue from there their trip to Paris using the bike.

“In public transportation, we are making face masks required, which will be distributed by the public transportation company.”The Deputy Mayor of Paris also commented that buses and metro services in the city are increasing the activity but reducing the stations, discouraging the use of public transportation for short distances. Of course, there will still be a place for the car, but we will try to have cars for the people who need to use the car.”

Latin America Case

Chile is one of the many countries which are promoting the use of bicycles for environmental and social distancing reasons.

During the conversation with her colleagues of the IDB, Gloria Hutt Chile Minister of Transport stressed, that mobility and cities will change post-COVID-19. The Minister remarked that despite observing a decrease in road fatalities due to less traffic, 16% in March, and 30% in April (compared to last year), a significant increase (50% more on average) in speeding vehicles circulating in the cities.

“In the future, we have to work very hard on educating people in respecting the rules of using the streets.”

“We would like to have cities with the majority of people using public transport or non-motorized modes, that´s our target.

“We have seen some statistics like in China, where it seems people are buying more cars, that´s a risk we have to prevent with the right conditions once we start to work again massively,” she concluded.

The Latin American country responded quickly when the first cases appear in March and opted for a dynamic quarantine system in different areas and four phases.

Nevertheless, a recent spike of the virus led to the decision to announce a total lockdown for city capital Santiago de Chile with nearly 6 million inhabitants.

Also, a nationwide quarantine for people over 75 is in effect. Chile´s population is estimated at 19 million people, so far, the country has 37,040 confirmed cases and 368 deaths.

On March 20, Argentina President Alberto Fernández announced a strict nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of the virus on the country, since then some restrictions have been eased. In the urban Greater Buenos Aires area, which encompasses a population of over 15 million, the lockdown has been extended through May 24.

One of the measures taken in the context of the coronavirus by Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, Mayor of Buenos Aires, is promoting the use of bicycles, working on gaining space with more areas being available for pedestrians and bikes.

“We have very long pedestrian areas in downtown Buenos Aires, and probably one of the largest dedicated bike pathways around the city, we go around 250 kilometers.”

“With the quarantine, we are promoting urban transportation, which somehow accelerates our view of what we are envisioning for Buenos Aires for the next years.”

“As a general concept, we are trying to avoid anything related to the car. The space of a car is too big to transport a few people or many times one person.” We are experimenting, and we are very excited about driverless, small buses.

Also, we are in the process of testing, in Buenos Aires, more efficient buses in terms of emissions,” he explained.

Argentina, a country with a population of about 44 million people, the quarantine began March 20 has 7134 confirmed cases and 353 deaths at the time of writing this article. To this date, the pandemic has infected more than 4 million people in over 180 countries, claiming over 300.000 lives.

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Recently, our Head of Communications, Manpreet Darroch undertook an interview in his home country with Room 9 Media in a new series of podcast run by this creative company. Room 9 Media was started in 2011 by John and Denise Billington. They have years of experience in safer and sustainable travel, communications and education.  They have been developing new and exciting resources ever since.

Right from the start, their objectives have been simple: to tackle the issues children and families face on the roads. So whether it’s pedestrian safety, parking problems or sustainable travel, tey seek to deliver a memorable message that’s both relevant and engaging.

LISTEN TO THE INTERVIEW ON SOUNDCLOUD

Only a few months back we were wrapped up warm in Stockholm, Sweden for the 2nd World Youth Assembly for Road Safety. This momentous event we as YOURS helped initiate was a stepping stone for the youth and road safety movement globally. We are super excited to share the Highlights Video from the Assembly and the full report illustrating the concept of the Assembly all the way through to the execution and follow up.

About the Assembly
The 2nd World Youth Assembly for Road Safety took place on February 18, 2020 in Stockholm, Sweden, under the framework of the 3rd Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety.

The main goal of the Assembly was to save young lives on the world’s roads and help reach the Global Goals targets 3.6 and 11.2, by: mobilizing and inspiring global youth to advocate for road safety; empowering young people and pushing for meaningful youth engagement on designing, implementing and evaluating a safe mobility system.

The Youth Assembly was initiated by YOURS – Youth for Road Safety and co-sponsored by the World Health Organization (WHO). The main partners were Michelin Corporate Foundation and Total Foundation. Partners of the Assembly were Fundación MAPFRE and VOLVO Group.

The Youth Assembly was organized for youth, by youth. The Global Youth Taskforce, a selected group of 11 young leaders from around the World, led the organization and creation of the event.

CHECK OUT THE SPEECHES, PERFORMANCES AND DISCUSSIONS IN VIDEO

Before the Assembly, the Youth Consultations took place in more than 50 countries from all parts of the globe. Through the Youth Consultations, the young leaders discussed the reality of road safety and safe mobility in their areas and shared their main challenges, demands and commitments. 1500+ youth participated in 200 Youth Consultations and with those results, the Youth Taskforce drafted a document that summarized the current situation of road safety for youths: The Global Youth Statement for Road Safety.

The Youth Assembly was attended by 160+ young leaders from 74 countries. The attendees were gender balanced and represented the six regions of the world. In addition, they came from different sectors such as academia, civil society, governments, corporations and multilateral institutions.

The Assembly’s programme combined different activities. In the morning, plenary sessions took place with speakers from different sectors and regions. Furthermore, the results of the Youth Consultations were presented and the Global Youth Statement for Road Safety was officially adopted. During the coffee breaks and lunch there was an opportunity to network, visit the art exhibition, listen to live performances and share thoughts at the expression wall. During the afternoon, 6 parallel sessions took place where youth leaders exchanged ideas with international experts about topics directly related to road safety such as: climate, health, equality, participation, sustainable cities and advocacy. After discussing the future of road safety with the Transport Ministers from Iceland and South Africa, the programme moved towards the Impact Generator Challenge Finals, where 3 winners got financial and technical support for their youth-led projects in Colombia, Botswana and Tajikistan.

Based on the evaluation of the Assembly, the desire of the youth delegates and the Global Youth Taskforce is to ramp up youth efforts and its impact. It is their wish to launch a Global Youth Coalition for Road Safety that is claiming their space on a much larger scale:  globally advocating for road safety and increasing local youth-led activities on the ground. Both efforts will energize a road safety revolution and lead to saving young lives on our roads.

Executive Director of YOURS, Floor Lieshout said, “We do our utmost best to continue to support the amazing youth leaders in the near future, while we face an unprecedented pandemic. we count on their creativity and we will find alternative ways to move forward in the short term”.

READ MORE ABOUT THE ASSEMBLY

DOWNLOAD THE REPORT SUMMARY