Our aim with this project was to encourage the use of alternative means of transport and other solutions than would reduce the traffic congestion and makes us live in slow cities, more ecological, sustainable and healthier for people and the planet.
The ideas
The heavy traffic at peak times is a problem that affects many people on a daily basis, and for many, it has become a routine to face these difficulties. To better understand the idea, it is necessary to know the reason for traffic saturation at peak times. In Brazil, the most congested capital, in relation to the total number of roads, is Recife, with about 60% slowness in its cheers during peak hours. Behind it comes Salvador, Rio de Janeiro, Fortaleza, São Paulo, among other cities. Curitiba is in eighth place, in the ranking of the worst traffic jams. But that doesn't happen just in Brazil. Traffic saturation is a problem to be solved on almost the entire planet. According to the ranking of the 15 cities with the worst traffic in the world, from the website "Viagem e turismo", the one who leads this list is the city of Moscow, in Russia, in fifth place comes the city of São Paulo, and in the seventh position, the capital of Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro.
According to the World Health Organization, in 2015, there were 1.25 million of deaths caused by car accidents and 3.7 million of deaths caused by atmospheric pollution. There are some ways to alleviate these problems. A great example would be the improvement of public transport: good schedules, exclusive bus lanes, ticket prices, integration of subways in some cities and expansion in major cities.
To be reliable, public transport needs to respect schedules. People need to be on time to get to work, school and other commitments. If public transport is the priority, most streets and avenues should be dedicated to buses and the minority to cars (except, of course, on very narrow traffic lanes where no buses pass). In large cities there are the underground subway lines, as in São Paulo. It happens that in Curitiba the priority is always cars, so public money is all used on streets, traffic lights, traffic agents and signs. There is no surplus or interest in investing in the subway.
The initiatives
We decided to carry out a campaign to encourage people to use less the car and choose alternative ways of mobility: buses, subways, other public transports, carpool, bicycles or walking if the distances are short. This would reduce traffic congestion, stress and the levels of pollution.
We created a video in Powtoon in which we explain the concept of slow cities as being more ecological, sustainable and healthier for people and the planet. In our video we show some statistics of car accidents and data related to the pollution and its impact on people’s health and economy. We give some examples of diseases provoked by pollution and we also highlight the levels of anxiety provoked by the time spent in traffic. To reduce these problems, we show some solutions, like using other means of transport than cars and the home office, which would reduce the number of cars circulating each day.
We created posts to share our messages in Instagram and we also created a blog with different articles in which we underline the benefits of public transport.
