Global Youth Coalition for Road Safety celebrates 1000 members

We are officially 1000 members strong! Time sure does fly, doesn’t it? It’s hard to believe that our journey as the Global Youth Coalition began from the voices of the youth delegates who came together in Stockholm that fateful February. It feels like a lifetime ago. 

The journey to 1000 young road safety advocates was a fun one but it definitely wasn’t easy. Our beginnings as a  Youth Coalition were met with the onset of the pandemic. The immediate conundrum was about how we could keep uniting young people if any opportunity to come together wasn’t really allowed. We couldn’t travel anywhere or fly to meet with our leaders - that was a struggle. 

BUT our spirit is strong and we didn’t let this challenge get in the way of us fighting for our rights, our safety, our voices, and our passion. The digital world paved the way for us to see our projects and programs through. That, paired with the enthusiasm and indomitable spirit of our young leaders made us a force to be reckoned with.

When we first launched, we had a little over 200 members. We were doing our best to get the information out there, letting other organizations and leaders know how urgent it is for us to address needs around road safety and sustainable mobility. It seemed like a pretty foreign idea. The question of why we were advocating for road safety specifically usually popped up.

As we grew as a Youth Coalition, not just in terms of our members but also in terms of the opportunities and programs we offered, more and more groups began to understand how road safety connects with the different Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Our youth leaders spoke about road safety and talked about how they connected with health, education, gender equality, reduced inequalities, sustainable cities, and climate action. 

Soon, we were pretty much the go-to group for sessions and discussions about youth and road safety. In our book, that’s a win!

As important as raising awareness is, we also went beyond speaking. We worked with our youth leaders to implement road safety projects around the world through Local Actions that brought us close to our goal of reducing the number of road-related deaths and fatalities by the end of the new Decade of Action. 

We weren’t just growing in number, we were also growing in terms of our abilities, commitments, networks, and more. What’s better is that we were growing together. 

Our very passionate members soon found themselves on different platforms, both virtual and face-to-face to raise awareness of road safety issues and to invite their peers to join and support the road safety movement. We even got a screen at the UN building!

We hit 1000 but we’re not stopping there. The only way is up! We will keep growing as a Youth Coalition, we will keep improving the opportunities and support we provide and we will keep #ClaimingOurSpace! 

BONUS: With a thousand members comes some very exciting news! But you’ll have to wait and see what it is. Hint: it’s a capacity development opportunity.