[sustran] UK: How to get teens off the streets [UPDATED]

[Todd Edelman]

*How to get teens off the streets [UPDATED]*
http://quickrelease.tv/?p=1490

Scare them silly. Shoot a horror movie 
<http://ghoststreet.co.uk/index.php/site/video> that's meant to shock 
them into being safer on bikes (wear a magic hat, bike helmets protect 
your head when you're hit by a speeding car) and how not to cross the 
road (listen to an iPod, get squashed, it's your own stupid fault).

This is the gist of the Ghost Street campaign 
<http://www.newcastle.gov.uk/core.nsf/a/ghost_street_press_release>. I'm 
sorry to say this campaign, and the DVD for schools that goes with it, 
is from my neck of the woods. What were they thinking? 'They' being 
Newcastle City Council. Why use classic victim-blaming scare tactics?

"Traffic is the biggest cause of accidental death of 12 to 16-year-olds."
No, traffic is not a killer, it's speeding, inattentive motorists that 
do the killing. And let's get rid of this word: "accidental". Instead of 
"accident", use "incident" or "crash". 99 per cent of road deaths are 
avoidable. It's not an "accident" when motorists speed along urban roads 
at many MPH above posted limits. It's not an "accident" when motorists 
overtake in stupid places or miscalculate gaps.

"Research has found that teenagers are easily distracted on the roads."
Sure they are. And they need to be made more aware of the potential 
danger of such inattention. But the Ghost Street campaign will have one 
major result: it will make teens want to drive, to be "protected".

The imagery for the campaign is illuminating. The markings for the dead 
body image - above - are on a pavement. Motorists don't just kill kids 
on the roads, they kill them on pavements, too. No amount of pedestrians 
"paying attention" and wearing light-coloured clothing will prevent 
drivers from mounting kerbs and killing people.

Newcastle City Council ought to be spending money on restraining 
drivers, not scaring pre-drivers into getting drivers' licences as soon 
as they possibly can.

Teens want to drive for a whole load of reasons, similar to the reasons 
most people want to drive, but why give them such a strong and gory 
reason to withdraw from the streets?

While the campaign is aimed at 11-16 year olds, there is a driving 
section but on here there's nothing urging motorists to pay attention to 
the road ahead and not use mobile phones when driving.

Teenage motorists text and drive too fast. The motoring section 
<http://ghoststreet.co.uk/index.php/site/speed> of the Ghost Streets 
campaign is extremely weak.


I've put in a Freedom of Information request to get answers to the 
following questions:

1. What is the budget for the Ghost Streets campaign?

2. How much money did Dene Films get for the Ghost Streets video?

3. How many DVDs were produced for the campaign?

4. How much did it cost to produce these DVDs?

5. How many DVDs are expected to be sold?

6. What research was carried out to ascertain whether this campaign 
would be effective at changing the behaviour of the intended audience?

7. Are there any plans for follow-up monitoring of this campaign?

I should hear back within 20 days and will reveal the answers here. [In 
the meantime, Newcastle City Council's Head of Highway Network and 
Traffic Management has given a lengthy rebuttal of the points above - 
see below the press release).

The campaign's press release is quite the horror story:

Welcome to Ghost Street

A spooky new film is about to give teenagers in Newcastle a supernatural 
lesson on road safety.

The film aimed at 12 -- 16 year olds, will be shown around schools in 
Newcastle to raise awareness of road safety and influence teenagers 
behaviour to use safety advice as part of their everyday life.

The film follows Tabby, your average and seriously distracted teenager. 
Living in a world of mp3 players, gossip and mobile phones until her 
distraction costs her dearly. Tabby finds herself trapped in an 
other-worldly place, a deathly-silent street until the ghosts come out 
to play.

Each gory character has met their end on the same street throughout the 
decades and each has a lesson to learn from the road.

Skater-boy -- should have looked before he skated onto the road.

Olivia -- an 80s throwback who wished she wore a helmet the first time 
she rode her new bike.

Rebecca -- a pregnant teenager who should have worn a seatbelt.

Commissioned by Safe Newcastle and the City Council's Road Safety 
Department, Ghost Street is to be used in schools across Newcastle as 
part of a lesson plans.

Cheryl Ford, Newcastle City Council's road safety services officer, 
said: "Teenagers naturally expect independence. They travel on their own 
or with friends more than they used to and are confident that they know 
what to do around roads and traffic. In fact, they over-estimate their 
road skills.

"We targeted teenagers for our film as research shows that around 14 
years-of-age is the best chance to influence young people's future 
behaviour.

"Teenagers love a good scary film and Ghost Street has plenty of creepy 
characters and plenty of gore to keep them hooked."

Safe Newcastle asked the Youth Parliament to be involved in the 
commissioning of the film.

Cllr Anita Lower, Chair of Safe Newcastle, said "Who better to decide on 
what type of film we produce than the target audience themselves.

The Youth Parliament discussed the issues that affect them as 
pedestrians and this formed the basis of the messages in the film. They 
were very excited by the idea of Ghost Street and felt that a thrilling 
fictional story would engage them more.

"Previous road safety films have raised the bar in what's expected from 
this type of educational film and I think Ghost Street meets this level."

Chris Chapman, of Dene Films, wrote and produced Ghost Street, said: "We 
had tremendous fun making the film but always had a focus on the serious 
nature behind the film. The young cast worked tirelessly in some testing 
conditions and the make-up team brought each character to life in 
wonderful grisly detail. We wanted to create a fictional drama that 
young people would enjoy watching and were going to remember for a long 
time."


Ghost Street - Response from Newcastle City Council.
Newcastle City Council places great value on feedback from the cycling 
community and other partners working hard to improve road safety and, as 
a listening council, we welcome your input.

Ghost Street is a multi-award winning educational resource designed by 
school children for school children. It is intended to provoke 
discussion around road safety and raise awareness of all aspects of road 
safety.

Since its launch in 2009, the film has been welcomed by every secondary 
school in the North East region, each of whom has demonstrated its 
support for the project by purchasing a copy for their lesson plans. 
Many of them have commented on how well their classes have responded to 
the discussion part of the lesson.

The film is designed to be seen in totality and we feel that judgments 
made on very short clips -- some as short as a few seconds - taken out 
of context can be unrepresentative and misleading.

Do you feel it is fair to condemn a film after watching 12 seconds of it?

We would also like to stress that Newcastle is the most active council 
in the North East in respect of actively supporting and promoting 
cycling -- last year, for example, we trained 3,500 school children in 
cycle proficiency as part of out ongoing commitment. But we are doing 
much more than that.

Here are some further points you might wish to take into consideration 
when coming to a conclusion about the film.

Key points

Ghost Street is based on an idea by the Local Youth Parliament who 
decided that a fictional story with a 'supernatural' theme would engage 
them more than a standard 'safety' film would.
Ghost Street is not intended to be viewed as a standalone film. That is 
why it is only available to schools delivering road safety lesson plans.

The film is part of wider road safety package, which includes a 
discussion session afterwards. To aid the discussion, teachers have the 
full support and guidance from their local Road Safety Officer.
Ghost Street carefully covers most scenarios of road safety including 
speeding, seatbelts, walking and cycling.

All facts and figures were provided by THINK! Road Safety.

Road Safety GB has endorsed Ghost Street and have supported the national 
roll out of the package.
Ghost Street has received several awards/award nomination:

IVCA Awards 2010 (Bronze medal for best original music, sound design, 
script)
Royal Television Society 2010 (Best drama, director, newcomer)
New York Festival Award 2011 (Nominated for best short film)

Newcastle City Council's commitment to sustainable transport

We fully advocate safer walking and cycling in Newcastle and this 
enthusiasm is reflected in Newcastle City Council's Sustainable 
Transport Programme Strategy and part of our ethos for School Travel 
Plans which has 100% approval from the Department for Education and Skills.

We have welcomed the constructive comments around making our website 
clearer so that readers can get a sense of the wider context and we will 
certainly make efforts to put this right.

We value you contribution as part of the debate and welcome any future 
comments you have to make about road safety.

David Embleton
Head of Highway Network and Traffic Management
Newcastle City Council.

-- 

Todd Edelman
Green Idea Factory,
a member of the OPENbike team

Mobile: ++49(0)162 814 4081

edelman at greenidea.eu
www.greenidea.eu
todd at openbike.se
www.openbike.se

Skype: toddedelman

Urbanstr. 45
10967 Berlin
Germany

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