Bogotá's Car Free Day in Brief

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  • The Bogotá Challenge
  • Progress Report
  • The International Support Consortium

    • On February 24th, 2000 the city of Santa Fe de Bogotá, Colombia's capital, will hold its first Car Free Day. It is being organized on a Thursday, a normal day of the week like any other -- with of course one small exception this time around. Bogotá is a fast growing city of some seven million inhabitations, a delicate ecosystem, already more cars than it can handle, and in dire need of a new transport game plan. The fifth most polluted city in Latin America, where automobiles account for 70 percent of all air pollution: 700 tons of carbonic gas, 57 tons of hydrocarbons, 24 tons of nitrogen oxide and two tons of sulfuric monoxide every day, it is the first major Third World city to give this innovative but challenging concept a try.

    Sin mi carro en Bogotá opens at 6:30 in the morning of the 24th, and will go on to 19:30 in the evening. It is to cover then entire urban area, and is being supported by a broad-based, region-wide, multi-level planning and mobility effort that you can follow through this site. This is an extremely ambitious and important pioneering effort which has significant implications not only for the future of transport in Bogotá, but also in other cities that are willing to look at this approach and consider putting it to work for themselves. Wouldn't you agree that this is something that deserves to succeed, and not only for the people of Bogotá? After all, as we now know, a Car Free Day . . . it can be a first step toward a sustainable transportation system and a sustainable city

    The @World Car Free Days Consortium is pleased to work hand in hand with the organizers to the end of providing as much international support and counsel as we can collectively muster to ensure the success of the Day. For the full month preceding the event, all our time and resources are being devoted to these ends. The key to these inputs is provided by the handful of links and items that appear in the red "Focus on Bogotá" menu box just to the left here. If you take a moment to click down the links, their purpose and content should become clear. And bear in mind that this is all being carried out as an example of international cooperation in the name of sustainable development and social justice. So if you think you can help in any way, do not hesitate to get in touch with us and make yourself known. There is plenty of work to keep all of us quite busy.

    The Bogotá Challenge

    The Bogotá Challenge is, in fact, really five major challenges:

    1. The challenge to those in charge in Bogotá -- to succeed in preparing, carrying out, and learning from this major city-shaping initiative, and thus to better serve all those who have voted for them and placed their confidence in their willingness and ability to make life really better for the people of the city.
    2. A challenge to the people of Bogotá themselves -- to be able and willing to get together to make the Day a success, to have a close look at their city in a new and different transport environment, and then to find ways to communicate their messages to each other and to their government and institutions to make sure that the best of the lessons are carried over from that one day to reshape their own transportation system in a way which better reflects their interest and priorities.
    3. A challenge to the concept of democracy -- to see if indeed it can cope with the needs for deeper, more active and new forms of citizen involvement in these and many other areas of everyday life in the 21st century.
    4. A challenge to the international expert community, formal and informal -- to see if they are going to come in and work to support this valiant attempt at innovation and sustainable development, rather than simply stand by passively and/or assert that all the old formulas are just fine for Bogotá and the rest of the developing world.
    5. A challenge to the next city or cities that are going to take up the flame from Bogotá - to learn from their lessons, and then try to do better yet, as part of the gradual process of cross-learning and international collaboration that constitutes the essential bedrock of, the only conceivable path to sustainable development.

    This is a project that in our view is well worth supporting, and moreover, we, the international community of scholars, thinkers and practitioners who have spent years in developing our understanding of these issues, are now in a position to lend a hand. So let's work, look and learn with Bogotá.

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    Progress Report

    To follow plans and progress, in addition to the information which is daily posted on this site, you are directed to the local Web page for Sin mi carro? and our latest links to the media coverage.

    For a complete picture of the project and the process behind it you are invited to consult...
    Note: The content of all pages can be quickly and roughly translated into and from Spanish. See Translate Help for more.

    International Support for Bogotá's Car Free Day

    If a city with all the problems and pressures of Bogotá can organize and pull off a successful Car Free Day, this would be a tremendous fillip to the many cities in the developing world that desperately need new examples, models and ways of moving toward more sustainable transport systems. It is for this reason that we hope that the leading edge of the international transport community will get behind this project and contribute as they can to its success.

    Things were made no easier by the fact that all the plans and preparations have had to be made in exactly one month of their contacting the CFD Consortium, since it is on that very date that "Sin mi carro?" will take over the street. Nonetheless, we took this as the stark reality of the moment (one more!) and tried to see what we can do with it. To this end, the Car Free Days Consortium made the decision to do what it can to rally international support and ideas for this. (You may care to think of this as a project within a project -- a world-wide Information Society effort in support of a pioneering local sustainability initiative. Perhaps a hint of a better and wiser future.)

    The intention of this portion of the site is to provide a two-way communications pipe, starting by reporting succinctly to the international observers and partners on the main points of the final plan for Bogotá's Great Day -- including for its main operational elements and components, but also for the monitoring and follow-up efforts which are seen as vital concomitants of the overall pioneering effort. This is intended to work as a two-way process of information and exchange. If this whole thing works as intended, the final painstakingly considered and detailed program will reflect the rich process of iteration and creative interactions, not only on the part of the many local actors involved but also between them and the international support effort which is being organized and communicated via this Web site.

    This section in fact has two sets of purposes. First, to serve as a handy checklist for any and all who wish to follow progress in the plans and preparations of the Bogotá event. And certainly no less important, for those people and groups in other places who are thinking about the possibility of organizing a Car Free Day of their own. These materials should provide valuable working tools for them, both in order to make up their minds, as counsel with ideas for getting the broad base that is vital if such initiatives are to succeed, and for the planning and preparation of their own events. Of which we can only hope that they will be many in number and excellent in their achievements.

    Here are some of the things we intend to get together to do to help our friends in Bogotá in the coming weeks:

    1. Register of International Support
      Sign the Bogotá Guestbook here, and let them know that they are getting the encour-agement of the leading edge thinkers and practitioners around the world. (Have a look at some of the other entries and comments before signing on; they may give you some ideas or inspiration. And if you can think of other colleagues whose name and work might help support this case, please ask them to join as well.)

    2. Our Goal:
      To get the support in this way of a least one hundred of the world's leading centers of thought, action and commitment to sustainable transport, sustainable cities, and a sustainable way of life. Check the Bogotá Guestbook today and see how we are doing.

    3. Use This Open Platform:
      Come into and contribute to the open platform as a working tool through which to post and channel information and counsel that we believe to help them ensure the success of their important project.

    4. Brainstorming and Support
      The Brainstorming section here provides an open space where friends and enemies of these concepts can go on record with their most cogent ideas, suggestions and arguments for their causes and recommended approaches. Review, comment on and make additions to the entries here, with the thought that these tools and counsel are going to help (and bearing in mind the very short amount of time that remains to make the project into the success that it deserves and that the world much needs).

    5. Build Knowledge, Understanding and Consensus:
      Upon completion of the Day, use these networking capabilities to assess the experience and to dis-cuss how might it usefully be built on and applied in other cities and in perhaps other ways. Look over what you see here and let us and the Bogotá team have the benefits of your comments

    The reader is also referred to the page of this site which outlines additional support and help needed from the international community to ensure not only the success of the Bogotá initiative, but also ensuring that the lessons of this experience are properly analyzed, widely shared, and eventually built on in other places. Back to top

    Note to the Translator: If you have been asked to translate these materials, may we ask that you share them with us all, sending a copy of your translation to The Commons Postmaster so that we can add it to the site for those who may not be so comfortable working in English. We thank you, and they will thank you as well. The Com-mons . . . . sustainability, sharing, team work!
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