Families for Safe Streets and partners commemorated 2023 World Day of Remembrance on November 19, 2023. This international event pays tribute to lives lost in road traffic crashes, acknowledges the efforts of emergency services, and advocates for safer streets. Learn about the public health crisis of traffic fatalities in Oregon and how you can be part of the solution. Together, let’s remember, honor, and work towards safer streets for all.
A processional walk departed 1259 Lloyd Center at 11:30 am; program with invited speakers began at Veterans Memorial Coliseum at noon. Veterans Memorial Coliseum is accessible by MAX (red, green, blue lines to Rose Quarter Transit Center or yellow line to Interstate/Rose Quarter) and TriMet bus lines bus lines 4, 8, 35, 44, 77 to Rose Quarter Transit Center.
In advance of this year’s event, we asked transportation leaders and decision-makers to sign onto this Traffic Safety Pledge for Leaders and Decision-Makers acknowledging the harms and inequities of this epidemic and the actions they commit to taking to reverse it.
How can I get more involved?
Why do we host this event every year?
In Oregon, between 2010 to 2022, data from the Oregon Health Authority shows that traffic fatalities grew from 351 in a single year to 606. Within that same time frame, the rate changed from nine deaths per 100,000 residents to 14 deaths per 100,000 residents. This is a public health epidemic: every day, our unsafe and incomplete public streets threaten our lives and livelihoods.
Vehicular traffic kills millions of people around the world. In response, the United Nations General Assembly adopted the World Day of Remembrance for Road Traffic Victims in 2005 to honor those who have lost their lives in road traffic and to acknowledge that the impact of a road fatality goes well beyond the victim to include families and friends, first responders, medical personnel, and the state patrol. The day is observed around the world on the third Sunday in November each year.
We aim to provide a platform for road traffic victims and their families to:
- remember all people killed and seriously injured on the roads;
- acknowledge the crucial work of the emergency services;
- draw attention to the generally trivial legal response to culpable road deaths and injuries;
- advocate for better support for road traffic victims and victim families;
- promote evidence-based actions to prevent and eventually stop further road traffic deaths and injuries.