The 6th “China Car Free Day” is Saturday, September 22. It’s a day when everyone in the whole wide world is encouraged to give up their car and try an alternative such as transit, walking or biking. The idea being that if you can give up your car for a day, you can give it up for two days or three days until you are living a car-free lifestyle. In order to advocate the green commuting with low power consumption, low pollution and low emission and improve city traffic and environment condition, Chenzhou government launched some activities on that day, whose theme of this year was “humanistic and green transportation” and it started from 7:00-19:00 on that day.

According to “the execution solution for 2012 Chenzhou vehicle non-working day”, except the emergency official cars, all the other cars should be laid-off during the day. From 7:00-19:00, traffic control was carried out on Nanhu road and Jujing road. Only pedestrian, bicycles, public buses and varnishes, and emergency cars can pass through these roads during the special time.

It was learned that in order not to influence citizens’ normal activities, all public buses would be put into operation on the day. Meanwhile, some public bus card recharge service stations were set on Wuling square, Beihu Park and other public places to ensure people’s convenience.

Some other activities like the bicycle cruise, questionnaire survey, index detection for environment and traffic technology, etc. were held on that day. Furthermore, relative departments cleaned the pavement and penalized the behaviors like parking cars on pavement.

The events, which vary by location, give motorists and commuters an idea of their locality with fewer cars. 22 September 2012 will be an opportunity to find another way for just one day to get around town, leave the car at home and walk, take a bus, train or cycle around town. All this is to help highlight the pollution caused by cars, not just the fumes but the whole cycle of waste and disruption, the noise, delayed journeys, the whole human misery caused by traffic congestion and car pollution.

Car free day was part of global events on sustainable mobility that ran from the 16th to the 22nd September. If you can avoid using your car on the 22nd September, even for just one journey you will be helping reduce pollution in your area and showing the world you care! And if more people go car free, the world will be less polluted, the streets will be less crowded and we won't be as dependent on foreign oil. The idea is also to show governments that people are willing to give up their cars and that resources should be put towards better bike lanes, sidewalks and other projects that make it easier to go car free.