Traffic and pedestrian safety is as local as making sure we can walk safely to our town centers, our schools, our neighbors’ front yards, our places of worship. But it is also a global public safety crisis. In the next sixty days, we all have an opportunity to participate in a world-wide effort to raise awareness about traffic and pedestrian safety by participating in something much bigger than ourselves, The Long Short Walk.
The Walk is part of Global Youth Traffic Safety Month, http://www.noys.org/global_youth_traffic_safety_month.aspx, and the United Nations Decade of Action, http://www.who.int/roadsafety/decade_of_action/en/.. GYTSM, which culminates on May 8 with events in Washington D.C., will involve high schools across the country and around the world, focused on safe driving. The Decade of Action seeks to eliminate millions of traffic and pedestrian fatalities between now and 2020. Both programs are affiliated with the worldwide Zenani Campaign, named in memory of Nelson Mandela’s great-granddaughter Zenani, who was killed in a crash in South Africa in 2010.
You — individually or with any group of any size — can take a few minutes to join in this important and fun event by organizing and posting information about, and a photo of, your own Long Short Walk. The essential information can be found here: http://www.makeroadssafe.org/longshortwalk/Pages/homepage.aspx. In summary, organize a group, take a walk, add up your total mileage, take a photo, and share it with the nation and the world by uploading it to the Long Short Walk website. The Hollister family and friends are organizing and we urge you to do the same.
