Announcement

Referendum text

Requirements for successful passage

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The Context

Bogotá, a city of nearly seven million inhabitants whose population is growing 160,000 per year, has a low motorization rate, with only 120 cars per 1,000 people. More than 80% of the population uses a low-quality bus system. The present city administration is structuring a very modern bus system based on exclusive busways which should reach all points in the city by the year 2015. The current administration has also promoted cycle use which has grown from 0,5% to nearly 4% in the last two years. A bicycle path network of more than 200 kilometers is under construction and should be in operation by the beginning of the year 2001.

Bogotá at 2,600 meters of altitude, thus with a low oxygen content in the air, needs all the clean air it can get. Despite the as-yet low number of private cars, the city already evidences severe air pollution problems, which should get worse once Colombia gets over the economic recession which it is currently going through and car sales pick up.

Bogotá has some unusual conditions and traditions, which makes it possible for the city to become the first in the world to solve its mobility problems based on a total restriction of car use. The city enjoys a 15 ºC (57 ºF) temperature year round, which makes it easy to walk a few blocks to a bus stop or to ride a bike a few kilometers. It has a high population density at 210 inhabitants per hectare and the average distance of 8 kilometers for home-to-work or study trips is rather short. The city already restricts car use at peak hours, effectively taking out of circulation 35% of cars every day through a system based on the last digit of the car license plate. For the last three years every Sunday the city closes 110 kilometers of main arteries to all auto traffic during 7 hours, so that more than one and half million people can use this public space for recreational purposes, mainly for bicycles. Bogotá also held the most successful car free day in the world last February 24 in which the city functioned normally without any cars on the streets except for taxis.

Beyond the transportation and environmental reasons to carry out the proposal, Mayor Enrique Peñalosa emphasizes its social integration implications. In a city with severe income inequalities and geographical segregation between poor and rich neighborhoods, the new system will seat together in buses high-level managers and shanty town dwellers and have them stand next to each other at traffic lights on their bikes, not separated by the window of a luxury car.

City authorities believe that discussion on the issue will raise awareness about the type of city people want for their children.

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Referendum Text

I. "CAR FREE DAY"

QUESTION: Do you agree (YES or NO) with establishing the celebration of an annual "Day without Cars" beginning the year 2001, which will prohibit all private car traffic in the city on the first Thursday of the month of February of every year during the period between 6:30 a.m. and 7:30 p.m.

II. "VEHICULAR RESTRICTION BEGINNING THE YEAR 2015"

QUESTION: Do you agree (YES or NO) with the objective of building an environmentally sustainable Bogotá, with cleaner air, less traffic congestion and a better quality of life, by prohibiting, starting January 1 of the year 2015, the circulation of all private automotive vehicles on the city streets on all work days, in the period between 6:00 a.m. and 9:00 a.m., and 4:30 p.m. and 7:30 p.m.

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Requirements for successful passage

Each item on the referendum must pass two hurdles if it is to have the force of law. Not only must they obtain a majority of the votes cast, but each must also have at least a third of the registered electorate expressing their vote on the issue.

Thus in this election the total number of people registered to vote in Bogota is 3,573,581. This means that the minimum number of votes requires in each case (for, against, and blank votes) must be more than 1,191,193.

It is generally considered prior to the election that the latter may be a bigger obstacle than the former. This is not least the case because this is an entirely new pattern of citizen expression and popular democracy in the country. Thus, obtaining that effective threshold level of interest and citizen expression is as important a challenge as the two car free items themselves.

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