Stockholm, Sweden - 17 February, 2020

During “This Is My Street: Safe and Healthy Journeys for Children & Youth,” an official pre-conference event coordinated by the Child Health Initiative before the 3rd Global Ministerial Conference on Road Safety, Ms. Mirjam Sidik, AIP Foundation CEO, was invited to speak alongside practitioners on strategies and the positive impact of transforming schools and urban streets into safer environments. Ms. Sidik spoke about speed reduction in Vietnam through the Slow Zones, Safe Zones, and Walk This Way programs, implemented by AIP Foundation, which contributed to major legislative milestones in October 2019 when the government announced the removal of fixed speed limits, demonstrating a critical shift towards dynamic speed limits and more adaptable speed limit regulation in Vietnam.

Other panelists also shared key findings and lessons from their work in creating safer road environments in their respective countries and regions, including their experiences securing speed reduction laws in Zambia, promoting Vision Zero for Youth in Mexico City, and pursuing urban design change in Moldova.

The session concluded with a conversation on translating the Stockholm Declaration into an action plan through the Child Health Initiative’s Manifesto 2030 on Safe and Healthy Streets for Children, Youth and Climate, which supports key action points of the Stockholm Declaration and emphasizes combining global advocacy with practical action to reduce road risks for children and youth. Representatives of Bloomberg Philanthropies, Fondation Botnar, Bernard van Leer Foundation, International Affairs from City of Fortaleza, Brazil, World Resources Institute, iRAP, and FIA Foundation offered their perspectives on future actions.

The manifesto outlines specific “call-to-action” criteria and campaign goals, including: every child and adolescent can expect a safe and healthy journey to school, streets where children mix with traffic have a default speed of no more than 30 km/hour, every urban street has a viable footpath and protected at-grade crossings, every city has set an ambitious target for protected cycle lanes, and a global adolescent summit to prioritize SDG action on adolescent health and rights.