International Walk to School Day is a global event that involves communities from more than 40 countries walking and biking to school on the same day. It began in 1997 as a one-day event. Over time, this event has become part of a movement for year-round safe routes to school and a celebration – with record breaking participation – each October. Today, thousands of schools across America – from all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico – participate every October.

Promoting International Walk to School day has many benefits including:

It’s Fun!
Remember the thrill of riding a bike for the first time or walking to school that first day?

There’s a feeling of joy and independence —a sense of adventure—that doesn’t fade. When walking or biking, parents and children get to appreciate things they don’t notice while driving—listening to the sounds of the neighborhood, seeing friends and neighbors and feeling connected with their community. Parents, children and friends can enjoy one another’s company without the usual distractions.

Walking and bicycling events celebrate these experiences and help make them possible for others. They bring schools and communities together for a common purpose. Most of all, they are fun!

We don’t usually walk to school, but after today we found out that it’s not that far. Now we plan to walk more often because it’s fun and safe! – Parent, California

Healthier Habits
Walking and bicycling to school enables children to incorporate the regular physical activity they need each day while also forming healthy habits that can last a lifetime. Regular physical activity helps children build strong bones, muscles and joints, and it decreases the risk of obesity. In contrast, insufficient physical activity can contribute to chronic diseases, such as diabetes, heart disease, cancer and stroke.

Cleaner Environment
I love Walk to School Day. It makes less pollution in the air. It is healthy for you. – Student, California

When families decide to lace up their sneakers or strap on their bike helmets to get to school  instead of riding in a car, they help reduce the amount of air pollutants emitted by automobiles.

Promoting Safety
The best part of the walk was walking for safety to help make the children’s walk to school a safe pathway and to teach them the importance of this event. – PTA Safety Committee Member, Utah

• Children and adults need to learn safe walking and bicycling skills.
• Drivers need to watch for others using the road.
• Safety problems along routes to school need to be fixed.

Many of the ways in which children can be safer on the way to school is highlighted in the Child Declaration for Road Safety.

Community Benefits
My favorite part of Walk to School Day was seeing so many families and people from our community come together to enjoy a safe and healthy morning walk to school. – Parent, Ohio

The whole community benefits from efforts to enable and encourage more children to walk or bicycle to school safely. Benefits include:

• Less traffic congestion. According to the 2011 National Center for Safe Routes to School report, personal vehicles taking students to school accounted for 10 to 14 percent of all personal vehicle trips made during the morning peak commute times (based on National Household Travel Survey Data, 2009). Reducing the number of private vehicles commuting to school can reduce morning traffic around the school. Less traffic congestion also improves conditions for pedestrians and bicyclists, creating a positive cycle—as the community sees more people walking and biking, more people feel comfortable walking and bicycling. 
• Stronger sense of community.The common goal of improving conditions for walking and bicycling brings families, neighbors, school officials and community leaders together. The sense of community also builds as children and parents develop walking and bicycling buddies and chat with neighbors on the sidewalk or path. 
• Safer streets. Communities with higher rates of walking and bicycling tend to have lower crash rates for all travel modes. One reason may be that motorists drive more cautiously when they expect to encounter walkers and bicyclists. More walkers and bicyclists can also improve personal security by providing more “eyes on the street.” 
• Lower costs. Encouraging and enabling bicycle and pedestrian trips reduces costs for the family, community and school district. Families save on gas, communities spend less on building and maintaining roads and school districts spend less on busing. In fact, one school district calculated $237,000 in annual savings. 
• Improved accessibility. Enabling students of all abilities to walk and bicycle to school makes it easier for everyone in the community to get around, including parents with strollers, senior citizens, residents without cars and residents with temporary or permanent mobility impairments. 
• Economic gains. Sidewalks, paths and other investments in pedestrian and bicycle infrastructure can increase home values and direct additional traffic to local businesses.

Read more about the International Walk to School Day here.
Get resources to encourage your children to walk to school safely here.

Our friends at the FIA Foundation have published a review on the Global Goals focusing on the Sustainable Development Goals.

The Sustainable Development Goals that are adopted at the UN will set the global mobility agenda for a generation.

Decisions taken over the next few years, decisions guided or influenced by the targets included in the Global Goals, will define our world far beyond the SDGs’ 2030 deadline. This is particularly true in the area of transportation, with long-term investment in everything from highways and mass transit to vehicle propulsion technologies to telematics to urban planning shaping the way our children and grandchildren will travel, their quality of life and their health. Much is at stake.

As world leaders conclude their speeches and the SDGs are formally adopted, attention will turn to practical implementation. The Global Goals encompass a wide agenda. Even within the goals and targets related to mobility there are many issues that need to be addressed. For the FIA Foundation, it makes sense to focus our efforts on a small set of key priorities on which we can make a real difference.

In Goal 3, ‘Health’, the Foundation is supporting efforts to meet target 3.6, to reduce road traffic fatalities by 50% by 2020, and target 3.9, to substantially reduce the contribution of road transport to air pollution by 2030.

Our road safety objectives include: supporting programmes and advocacy for safer vehicles, with the aim that all new cars meet minimum UN safety standards by 2020; urging governments and development agencies to star rate all roads, with the aim that we move towards minimum ‘3 star’ (out of 5) safety performance for all road users on the 10% of highest risk roads by 2020; supporting legislative change, awareness raising and enforcement to encourage national efforts to secure 100% seat-belt and motorcycle crash helmet use by 2020. This is the agenda we will be taking to the 2nd Global High Level Conference on Road Safety – and the first SDG road safety implementation conference – in Brasilia in November.

Air pollution is an even greater killer than road traffic injuries and emissions from road traffic are a significant contributor. Working through the Partnership for Clean Fuels & Vehicles, a highly successful coalition arising from the first round of (Millennium) Development Goals, and as a member of the Climate & Clean Air Coalition, the Foundation has contributed to the phase-out of leaded fuel, and is enabling reductions in sulphur content in fuel in some countries, and efforts to tackle particulate emissions. Much more must be done.

But fuel efficiency is only part of the equation. Car use must be rationalised and reduced, and the underlying causes of car dependency tackled, by ensuring there are efficient and affordable alternatives – particularly accessible mass transit. So in Goal 11, ‘Cities’, we are focusing on target 11.2, to ensure safe and sustainable urban mobility by 2030. Other organisations are leading the effort to persuade policymakers to balance car use with mass transit. At the Foundation we are focusing on supporting non-motorised, low-carbon, transport: walking and cycling. Through our ‘Share the Road’ partnership with the UN Environment Programme, and in exciting new alliances soon to be announced, the Foundation aims to work at the forefront of efforts to enable safe and equitable access to sidewalks, cycle lanes and to promote a ‘feet first’ re-imagining of urban mobility design.

At the core of this agenda our vision, encompassing the Health and City Goals, but also goals on education (4), sustainable infrastructure (9) and inequality (10), is for every child to have a safe route to school – ideally a journey they can make independently by foot, bike or bus – by 2030, with low speed limits a crucial element. Our new partnerships with UNICEF and Save the Children; the proven results of our road safety NGO partners – AIP Foundation, Amend, EASST and Fundacion Gonzalo Rodriguez; and the diversity and reach of our member FIA club network forms the basis of a strong alliance to make this vision a reality and, in the words of the SDG communique ‘transform our world’.

This week there is a palpable excitement and enthusiasm amongst the international development community assembling in New York. And for the first time those of us involved in road safety and sustainable mobility are inside the ‘club’ and have a direct stake and role in delivering the global agenda. There will inevitably be a sense of celebration as the Global Goals are adopted. They are the result of years of consultation and negotiation, and – whether they ultimately succeed or fail – at this moment represent the best of international cooperation and hope for the future. ‘Project Everyone’, a massive communications campaign, will try to connect the excitement inside the UN bubble with millions of people across the world.

This connection to real people is vitally important. The high idealism of much of the diplomatic discussion that led to the Global Goals has often seemed divorced from national political realities that obstruct progress through indifference or design. If, for example, we are to achieve a 2020 road safety target many governments and institutions will have to show much more commitment and energy than they have hitherto. Civil society activism can help to identify and support political champions, ensure accountability and provide the impetus to build home-grown strategies. When harnessed, this energy must be channelled through focused, practical, measurable solutions that address local issues and are owned locally and delivered through local expertise.

‘On behalf of the peoples we serve…’, this is how world leaders begin their commitment to deliver the Global Goals. And this is an agenda for people. It is for the child who misses out on an education because her leg has been crushed by a truck on the way home from school; it is for the parent who can’t let her child play outside because the air is brown and burns his throat; it is for the community torn in two by a new highway they are too poor to use; it is for the islanders sinking further into the sea every time we fill our fuel tanks. These stories, this human experience, and the opportunity for progress: this is what motivates all of us at the FIA Foundation, and this is why we will strive to do what we can to deliver on the promise of the Global Goals.

Support the campaign to promote the Global Goals at http://www.globalgoals.org/

The World Health Organization has teamed up with the Pulitzer Center to strengthen the advice given to journalists on road safety. As a component of the Bloomberg Philanthropies Global Road Safety Programme 2010-2014, WHO engaged with more than 1300 journalists in nine countries through tailored workshops on road safety. The aim was to increase media interest in and understanding of road safety as a critical health and development issue.

Produced jointly by WHO and the Pulitzer Center, with financial support from Bloomberg Philanthropies, Reporting on road safety: a guide for journalists reflects the experiences and lessons learned from these workshops with journalists and editors, in particular those from low- and middle-income countries. In the guide and its accompanying pamphlet entitled 16 story ideas, readers will find links to stories, suggestions for new angles, descriptions of projects, and tips from editors, journalists and public health experts to enhance reporting on road safety.

An introduction the WHO’s 16 story ideas focuses on the following:

IN THIS BOOKLET WE USE A BASIC FORMAT — WHAT IS MY STORY’S FOCUS? WHO SHOULD I TALK TO? WHAT DO I ASK? — TO GUIDE YOU THROUGH VARIOUS KINDS OF ROAD SAFETY STORIES. THEY RANGE FROM SIMPLE COVERAGE OF A ROAD CRASH TO MORE AMBITIOUS  STORIES ON ROAD SAFETY AS A CRITICAL PUBLIC HEALTH ISSUE.  THE LIST IS BY NO MEANS EXHAUSTIVE. ITS PURPOSE IS TO POINT YOU IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION AND HELP YOU THINK ABOUT VARIOUS WAYS TO APPROACH ROAD SAFETY STORIES IN A WIDER CONTEXT.

1. A road crash is not just a random incident: dig deep and ask why it happened.
2. Keep a record of your road crash stories, reuse the material, make links, and look beyond the single event.
3. Do not consider that a fatal crash is “covered” just because you wrote about it when it happened. Follow up on it, and write about it until the reasons for the crash have been fully investigated.
4. Don’t wait for a crash to hap- pen; write on trends and get the experts’ views.
5. While writing a story, keep in mind that you and your readers are all road users: what you write about applies to you all.