When: Saturday November 15^th, 2014

Where: Oxford Street, London

What:

Grassroots activists from Stop Killing Cyclists and Stop The Killing are organising the first ever massive, peaceful, dignified National Funeral for the Unknown Victim of Traffic Violence, to be held along Oxford Street to Marble Arch, to symbolically mark all those who have lost their lives, or had them destroyed on Britain’s roads from:

• Traffic Violence
• Air-pollution
• Obesity, through fear of walking or cycling
• Worldwide effects of climate change.

The direct action is timed to fall on the weekend of the World Day Of Remembrance For Road Traffic Victims.

Launch video for the National Funeral on YouTube: http://goo.gl/v3KRtz
Facebook Event page: http://goo.gl/DX2l13
Stop Killing Cyclists website: www.StopKillingCyclists.org
Stop The Killing website: www.StopTheKilling.org.uk

Stop The Killing Co-Founder Steve Routley said:

“We need to end the culture of acceptance that surrounds traffic violence and bring together road users of all kinds from across the country to demand real change in the way roads are perceived as public spaces.”

Stop The Killing Co-Founder Donnachadh McCarthy also said:

“The staggering number of deaths and injuries resulting from motorised traffic over the last decade stands at 2,400,000 people. This horrifically equates to the combined populations of Birmingham, Glasgow, Manchester and Cardiff! This National Funeral of the Unknown Victim of Traffic Violence is a clarion call to people across the UK to unite to bring this carnage and environmental destruction to an urgent end.”

The National Funeral Protest will present 10 Demands calling for urgent action from local and national government.

RSVP: [email protected] or 07947 884299

End.

 

Notes for editors:

1. Stop Killing Cyclists is the direct action protest group set up after the recent spate of cyclist killings in London. They arranged the mass Die-In at TfL HQ where 1,500 cyclists lay down in the road in protest at the lack of safety investment in London.

2. Stop The Killing is the associated group of pedestrian, cycling and environmental grassroot activists who want to eliminate traffic violence.

3. Some of the statistics which the National Funeral wishes to highlight:-

Over the last decade (2003-12) the following “Pyramid of Death” resulted from traffic violence:

UK Cyclists Killed: 1,233 (DoT)
UK Pedestrians Killed: 5,787 (DoT)
UK Motorists Killed: 19,293 (DoT)
UK Patients Killed by Transport Pollution: 50,000 (NHS)
UK residents killed through physical inactivity due to lack of cycling infrastructure (estimated): 400,000 (Prof. Garfield)
Ten Year Total Killings: 476,313
Thus the number of people whose deaths can be attributed to traffic violence over the last decade is the equivalent of the population of Manchester.

Global Deaths due to Climate Crisis (ten years): 4,000,000 (UN)
Total UK Cyclists killed seriously injured or injured: 198,000
Total UK Pedestrians killed, seriously injured or injured: 298,300
Total UK Motorists killed, seriously injured or injured: 1,913,502
Total killed, seriously injured or injured on UK Roads over ten years: 2, 409,802.
This is the equivalent of the entire populations of Birmingham (1.1 million), Glasgow (0.6), Cardiff (0.3) and Manchester (0.5) combined.

4. The National Funeral protest’s 10 Demands are:

1. Stop the Killing of Children – set up national, multi-billion pound programme to convert residential communities across Britain into living-street Home Zones to abolish dangerous rat-runs.
2. Stop the Killing of Pedestrians – establish a national programme to fund pedestrianisation of our city and town centres, including the nation’s high-street, Oxford Street.
3. Stop the Killing of Pensioners from excessive speed - introduce and enforce speed limit of 20 mph on all urban roads, 40 mph on rural roads/lanes and 60 mph on all other trunk roads.
4. Stop the Killing of Cyclists - invest £15 billion in a National Segregated Cycle Network over the next 5 years.
5. Stop the Killing by HGVs - ban trucks with blind spots by making safety equipment mandatory and strictly enforce current truck-safety regulations, to reduce levels of illegally dangerous trucks down from estimated 30% to less than 1%.
6. Stop the Killing without liability - introduce a presumed civil liability law on behalf of vehicular traffic when they kill or seriously injure vulnerable road-users, where there is no evidence blaming the victim.
7. Stop the Killing from Lung, Heart and other Diseases caused by vehicular pollutants - make it mandatory for particulate filters that meet latest EU emission standards to be fitted to all existing buses, lorries and taxis.
8. Stop the Killing at Junctions - introduce pedestrian crossing times long enough for elderly disabled to cross. Legalise filtered junction crossings by cyclists with strict legal priority for pedestrians and carry out urgent programme of physically protected left-hand turns for cyclists.
9. Stop the Killing from Climate Crisis caused by CO2 emissions - all transport fuels to be from environmentally-sustainable, renewable sources within 10 years.
10. Focus on Life! Transport governance must make safety and quality of life the top priority. Reform all council transport departments, the Department of Transport and Transport for London into Cycling, Walking and Transport Departments with formal pedestrian and cyclist representation.