The China Environmental Protection Foundation asked people to walk more and drive less. We created an outdoor advertisement on the street to spread this message. We launched this campaign in September 2009 and achieved great results. Therefore we re-organized this campaign on March 16, 2010 to attract more media coverage and participation.

Most significantly, the Shanghai Municipal Government selected this campaign to feature as the main event during World No Car Day on September 22, 2010. Shanghai Vice Mayor Shen Jun even went to the campaign site to participate, and it received coverage on CCTV and Shanghai TV (STV), two of the most influential media outlets in the country. The Green Pedestrian Crossing was carried out in 7 main streets of Shanghai and later expanded to 132 roads in 15 cities across China.

We laid a giant canvas, 12.6 meters long by 7 meters wide on the ground, covering the pedestrian crossing with a large leafless tree. Placed on either side of the road beneath the traffic lights were sponge cushions soaked in green, environmentally friendly, washable and quick dry paint. As pedestrians walked towards the crossing, they would step onto the green sponge and as they walked, the soles of their feet would make foot imprints onto the tree on the ground. Each green footprint added to the canvas like leaves growing on a bare tree, which made people feel that by walking they could create a greener environment.

The total number of pedestrians that participated exceeded 3,920,000 people. The event attracted widespread media attention and coverage on major news channels, including China Central TV station (CCTV) and STV, and even Britain’s BBC 2.Over 690 popular online media sites including Sina, Yahoo, YouTube and Baidu broadcast the campaign and it was featured on Sina Microblog (China’s Twitter/Facebook) through news and re-tweets, nearly 752,000 times, with more than 978,000 comments made.

Without any investment in media, this event managed to generate over RMB 62 million worth of free publicity, reaching over 5.2 million people. The Shanghai Municipal Government selected this idea to be featured during the annual “World No Car Day” campaign on September 22, 2010, in which was attended by Mr. Shen Jun, Deputy Mayor of Shanghai. The Green Pedestrian Crossing print was later exhibited at the Shanghai Zheng Da CANART Museum.