Merseyside residents are being encouraged to ditch their cars and embrace fun, friends, family and freedom by choosing fossil-free ways to get around this World Car Free Day.
A weeklong series of events will culminate with a free family friendly festival at the Mystery Park on Sunday 24 September, which will include live music and entertainment, stalls and workshops, and ends with an all-ages bike ride to the new urban parklet at Mann Island.
Schedule:
- Starts at 9am with the regular junior Park Run
- At 10am market stall will open and there’s a Love Wavertree ‘run a mile’ event
- Fun all day with Childwall Emporium on arts and crafts and Living Streets family activities, bike skills sessions for kids, treasure hunts, playground, plus Liverpool Magic Circle member John the Great magician at 2pm
- Free, all-day Dr Bike sessions where local bike mechanics will give your bike the once over
- Bike maintenance workshops with Hollie from Energise Cycles at 12pm and 2pm
- Music every hour from 10.30am, including Liverpool’s Cheery (12.30pm), Ukulele Club (1.30pm), local solo act Andrew Stride (2.30pm) and Dog Brainz (3.30pm), who are about to release their second album of “good time northern pop punk”
- Family bike ride leaves on National Cycle Route 56 to the town centre at 4pm –register for the ride by signing up the Aigburth Community Cycling Club here
The event is being supported by Cycling UK and local council wards Penny Lane, Church, Wavertree Village, Smithdown Road, Greenbank.
On the day we’ll have help from Aigburth Community Cycling Club, Cycle Liverpool, GoodGym, Liverpool City Council, Liverpool City Region Combined Authority, Living Streets, Love Wavertree, the Merseyside Cycling Campaign, ParkRun, Peloton Liverpool, the Penny Lane Wombles, St John’s Ambulance, Sustrans, Transition Liverpool, Zero Carbon Liverpool and more.
Even more events
Ignite Liverpool is hosting a one-off special of their regular quick-fire talks series on Wednesday 20 September, asking people to speak to the theme ‘Merseyside 2030 – Zero Car City?’.
Register to speak here. Register to attend here.
Peloton Liverpool will be running a special ‘Joy Ride’ on World Car Free Day itself, happening this year on 22 September.
Sign up the Peloton group here and keep an eye out for details
St Cuthbert’s primary school is also planning to open a playstreet for the day on Church Road in Old Swan.
From the organisers…
Kirsty Styles, co-chair of the Merseyside Cycling Campaign, says: “Today in most countries, it is easier to imagine the end of the world than it is to imagine our lives with fewer car trips. But imagine – and take action – we must.”
“In 2019, our council
declared a ‘climate emergency’ and said that everyone must now work together to meet the ‘challenge of an impending ecological disaster by making Liverpool a Net Zero Carbon city by 2030’.
“Transport
is the second-largest contributor to the city’s carbon emissions and, according to the council’s own transport report , we need many more people to switch from driving their own cars to walking, wheeling or public transport.
“Data collected before the pandemic found that most car trips made in the city region – totalling 300 million journeys – were less than three miles. That’s just 15 minutes on a bike.
“So what would Merseyside with fewer cars look like? And how do we get there?”
Elke Weissmann adds:
“We have lots of research that suggests walking and cycling is better for our health, but it is also better for our communities. If we want to live happier, more connected lives, then we need to try and walk, cycle and use public transport more.”
“The car free day events are all meant to help people across Merseyside a sense of how this can be achieved – and give people the confidence that they can be part of it.”
These events are all coinciding with efforts being made across the world to understand what we all may need to do to ensure our planet remains liveable in the future.
It’s Global Goals Week (15-24 September), European Mobility Week and Travelwise Week (16-22 September), Liverpool Climate Week (18-22 September), and of course, World Car Free Day (22 September). Do feel free to let us know of anything else that is happening during this time.
