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I apologise for cross postings! Please find below a request from the Transportation Issues Committee of the Ecology Action Centre to participate and support Car Free Day. Stay tuned for planned events closer to the Day!! Dear Sust-Mar List Subscriber, We all know we pay dearly for the privilege and convenience of using our automobiles. Each year an average of 93 Nova Scotians are killed in traffic accidents and 4 430 are seriously injured. Increasingly, we all experience the adverse effects of automobile use. We’ve heard about its impact on human health, air and water quality, habitat, climate change, global energy supplies, and the overall health of our community. In short, our car culture is affecting the well-being of future generations of Nova Scotians. It is time to act! Thursday, April 19th, 2001 is Earth Car Free Day, [www.carfreeday.com] an international event to promote global reflection on automobile use and to encourage alternate modes of travel. The Ecology Action Centre’s Transportation Issues Committee (TIC) is planning a number of activities to celebrate Earth Car Free Day and to promote it within the Halifax Regional Municipality. To raise awareness TIC will ask HRM for a fare free day for Halifax Transit as a way of showing their public endorsement of Car Free Day. Transit staff have been approached and are receptive to the idea. Encouraging people to leave their car at home and use alternate travel is challenging. It will require our collective effort. Because of links between dependence on the automobile and air pollution, climate change, human health and the health of the environment we ask you to help us by: · sending a letter of support for Car Free Day to TIC before March 5th (see next page); · joining the Car Free Day Organizing Committee; · spreading the word and getting your colleagues, friends and family committed to busing, peddling, paddling, perambulating or car-pooling on April 19th; · or simply thinking creatively and letting us know about it. The success of Car Free Day will take the work of us all to help create the public spirit. Your letter, along with those from dozens of other non-profit and community health organizations, will help us make a strong and convincing statement about the growing public recognition that there are viable alternatives to single occupancy vehicle use and that these should be supported. If you have any questions or comments please contact Peggy Cameron at cameron@clean.ns.ca, Rebecca O’Brien at trax@istar.ca (492-0924) or Daniel Rainham at drainham@is2.dal.ca. Letters should be sent to the Ecology Action Centre at 1568 Argyle St., Halifax Nova Scotia B3J 2B3. We will present all letters to the Mayor and city council during the first week of March. Letters may also be sent directly to the Mayor, but we would like a copy as well. Sincerely, Susanna Fuller Transportation Issues Committee Ecology Action Centre Statistics to include in your letter: In your letter of endorsement for Car Free Day please ask HRM to develop an integrated environmentally sustainable transportation policy for its citizens. You may want to consider: · Transportation is a major link to climate change, smog, acid rain, hazardous air pollutants and health. It accounts for 27% of NS’s greenhouse gas emissions. In Canada from 1990-96 there were more and larger private vehicles; kms logged increased by 10% with a 34% increase in light trucks, SUVs and vans and a 4% decrease in the number of automobiles. (1999: Neitzert, F. et.al. Canada’s GHG Inventory 1997 (Ottawa: E.C.) pp 4,5,19) · Air pollution increases the chance of asthma attacks and respiratory infections especially for the very young, the elderly and those with existing respiratory disease. (1990: J. Hilborn & M. Still, Canadian perspectives on air pollution [SOE report 90-1] (Ottawa: EC) pp 19-20) · Automobile emissions are estimated to cost the Nova Scotia healthcare system well over $200 million/year. (June 16, 2000: Hughes, Larry, PhD et.al. Proposed Highway 101 Twinning Environmentally Sustainable Alternatives (Halifax: Whale Lake Research Institute) · Only 35% of Nova Scotia youth are active enough to achieve optimal health benefits (2001: Campagna, Phil, PhD. et al. Measuring Physical Activity Levels of NS Children & Youth Research Pilot Report January, 2001 (Halifax: Dalhousie U., NS Sport & Rec.). The average car makes 2,000 trips of 3 km or less/year. Many of these trips could be done using other modes such as foot, bicycle or public transit. (EC Transportation Challenge) · The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concludes climate change is likely to have wide-ranging, mostly adverse impacts on human health with significant loss of life (1995: IPCC 2nd Assessment Climate Change 1995. p.5) · The Physicians’ Statement on Climate Change states: As physicians, we fear that global climate change carries with it significant health, environmental, economic and social risks and that preventive steps are justified....Therefore we urge prompt and effective action to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases. This statement has been endorsed by 39 associations including the Candaian Institute of Academic Medicine, Canadian Society for Clinical Investigation, College of Family Physicians of Cannada, College of Family Physicians of Candada, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons of Canada, Socitey of Obstreticians and Gynecologists of Canada, Lung Association of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick Lung Association, and the Medical Society of PEI. · The CAA estimates a car cost about $8,000/year to own and operate. Of every $100 of retail spending in 1999, Canadians spent $35.70 on motor vehicles, parts and services, $19.50 on food and non-alcoholic beverages, and $9.70 on clothing, accessories and footwear. (2000: Statistics Canada. Quarterly Retail Commodity Survey. The Daily, 5 April ) · The NS Department of Transportation estimates a twinned highway costs about $1 million/kilometer to construct and a sub-division road $250-500,000. -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*- The preceding message was posted on the Sustainable Maritimes mailing list (sust-mar). http://www.chebucto.ns.ca/lists/sust-mar -*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*-*- Volunteer moderator: Paul Falvo mailto:sust-mar-owner@chebucto.ns.ca To submit a message to sust-mar, please send it to: mailto:sust-mar@chebucto.ns.ca PLEASE SEND MESSAGES TO SUST-MAR IN PLAIN TEXT ONLY MESSAGES CONTAINING HTML (MIME) CANNOT BE POSTED
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