THE SCOOP ON CAR BUSTERS

Alright, so here’s everything you ever/never wanted to know about Car Busters – its history, its projects, its role in the wider movement… I’ll also tell you what the work involves, what it’s like to work in the organisation. If, at the end of all this, you have questions or whatever, just let me know. I'm going on the assumption that it's better to give you too much information than too little...

History
Car Busters was founded following the first "Towards Car-Free Cities" conference in Lyon in 1997 as a means to continue the momentum of the conference – to serve as an ongoing forum and resource centre for people working on transport issues. The main thrust of this was the quarterly magazine. At first Car Busters was a project of European Youth for Action (EYFA), an Amsterdam-based network with which we work. Before long we became independent as a non-profit organisation, while still using EYFA’s coordinating services for receiving staff funded by the European Union’s Youth Directorate. (See more on this under ”Staff,” below.) Car Busters quickly grew in scale and level of ambition, and today, three years later, the project is known by transport activists and campaigners around the world. 
Above all, Car Busters aims to build and maintain the international car-free movement. We are based in Prague, but as we are an international centre striving to serve groups all over the world, the work itself is office-based and not focused on Prague itself. (There are other groups doing local transport campaigns, which we support where possible.)
At first we had two staffers, but in its second year it grew to four, which continues to be the number of staff today. 
We moved from Lyon to Prague in January 2000, and we are set up with a nice office in the Strasnice district, sharing the kitchen and bathroom with Nadrace Partnersvi (Environmental Partnership for Central Europe).

Philosphy/Role in Wider Movement
Car Busters has taken on the unofficial role of representing the more radical end of the spectrum on transport issues, exposing the rest of the movement and sometimes the general public to such ideas, and hopefully pushing them a bit in that direction. We see the car as a fundamentally destructive technology, regardless of what the fuel source may be, regardless of how energy-efficient the engine may be. For example, we see the car’s speed in itself as a problem. Deterioration of the urban environment is encouraged by vehicle speeds of over 15 km per hour – people don’t save time by traveling faster; they travel further as distances between destinations increase – whereas various modes of slow-speed transport encourage mixed-used, high-density, compact development.
We are concerned not just with pollution but with how the car dominates public spaces, kills community life, contributes to universal isolation, kills 500,000 people a year, and leads to unwalkable cities, etc. We don't hesitate to expose the so-called "clean car" and the interests promoting it over more fundamental change. Nor do we look at transport as an isolated issue -- rather, we connect it to broader issues such urban design, local self-sufficiency and corporate power. 
As an example of our radicalism, we provocatively chose September 21 as the day for World Car-Free Day, and when people ask why we chose the day before the European Union's car-free day, we say that we want to distance ourselves from the E.U.'s transport policy (of promoting TENS and TINA road-building programmes) and E.U. trade policies favouring long-distance transport of corporate products while local economies suffer. Of course we try to combine our radicalism with humour and cheekiness, and try to have a somewhat professional image to allow the radicalism to be taken more seriously. 
An example of our cheekiness and "chutzpah": When we were refused a press pass to the Velo Mondiale conference and told we must pay 450 EUROS per person to attend, instead we simply showed up with a Dutch work bike filled with books, magazines, leaflets and stickers, and set up shop in the lobby direct-action style. And because it would have looked silly for the organisers to turn us away, we were totally accomodated, given free food, and allowed to stay for the week. What's more, we found that our proposed workshop was included in the final version of the conference schedule, despite having been told earlier that we had missed the deadline for workshop propositions. And so we have found that "the squeaky wheel gets the grease" and that "direct action gets the goods" — we get a lot more attention by being a bit outrageous. 
While Car Busters has pretty much defined the "left" end of respected opinion or credibility within the transport movement, I don’t think we pull the movement to the left because we are radical per se. I think that to be radical or subversive and be respected and listened to, you have to compensate by being exceptional in some other way(s), and the more ways the better. When you combine humour with your radicalism, you expand your audience incredibly (examples: Matt Groening’s "Work is Hell" book, or Micheal Moore’s "TV Nation" show). If you have top-notch writing, you have a
similar effect. Or it can be cartoons and graphics. Or you can have better layout than the rest of the movement’s publications. Or you can cover new and exciting (cutting-edge) ideas that can be found no where else in a readable format. Or you can excel in investigative journalism, breaking new stories to the world or running stories censured by mainstream press. Or you can offer the best source of printed resources, so that more conservative people (planners, consultants, lobbyists) will come to you for what they need... We haven’t excelled or succeeded in all of these areas, and there are certainly things I’ve left out, but I list some of them here so you get the idea of why we try to maintain fairly high standards.

Projects
Car Busters aims to be as useful as possible to people working on transport issues, while also taking a leading role and building the movement’s exposure among the general public. Aside from a quarterly magazine, Car Busters runs a small but growing mail-order resource centre, publishes a monthly e-mail bulletin in three languages to update people on the goings-on in the transport movement and the Car Busters project, publishes occasional books/booklets such as the Car Busters Graphics Book and the soon-to-be-relased "CARtoons" comic book, helps organise periodic "Towards Car-Free Cities" conferences, and responds to numerous requests for information. Car Busters acts as a support for transport activists, campaigners and planners, transferring between them information, ideas, inspiration and an occasionally bad sense of humour. This year we publicised and coordinated the first World Car-Free Day, an event which we dreamt up ourselves as a way to increase the profile of this movement, and which was a great success.

Magazine
The magazine has so far been the largest single project, taking up perhaps 50% of our time, when you include all aspects of running it. With a circulation of 2,500 to 3,000 (depending on the particular edition), the magazine is distributed in bookshops and newsstands, as well as by activists who sell it and keep a percentage for their local group. 
Currently we have about 350 subscribers. We think we could rather easily reach 1,000 subscribers within a period of one year, yet we have always been too caught up in other projects to devote time to a serious subscription-boosting effort. But we have decided to get set up to accept payments by credit card through our web site, which should make it simpler for people to subscribe, and thus increase subscriptions supposedly by 30 to 40%.
The magazine has attempted to stay on the cutting edge of the movement, to provide new information and perspectives that can help and enhance campaigns everywhere. We take care to avoid repetition, and not just cover the same old Critical Mass and Reclaim the Streets actions. So we focus on what’s new and exciting, what’s relevant to people no matter where they live, and what people can really learn from. We also try to inspire people to take action, and to give them the feeling that they are part of something global.
We usually have a theme for each magazine, which we develop together. We then delegate magazine sections (such as ”Letters” or ”Industry Watch”) to each collective member, who puts his/her section together, including page layout, with the feedback of the others. Finally, we edit the text all together. We obtain graphics from a number of sources and artists, and produce some ourselves.

Monthly Bulletin
We produce a monthly e-mail bulletin in three different language versions (English, French and Esperanto), giving updates on the goings-on in the car-free movement and in Car Busters. A total of about 500 people receive the bulletin. It takes about an afternoon for one person to write/compile it.

World Car-Free Day
This year Car Busters has dreamt up and coordinated the first World Car-Free Day, a day of action taking place simultaneously on every continent, to make the public aware that the car-free movement exists, to get people thinking about these issues, and instigate longer-term change. Our work has involved publicity, press work, production of supporting materials and information, creation of a web page specific to the event, organising a local action in Prague etc. Post-event reports are now up on the website; enthusiasm for the event was widespread, and it seems a big success. Possibilities for the event in upcoming years are limitless…

Resource Centre
The idea of the resource centre has been to provide as much useful information and resources as possible ”under a single roof.” Some items are available for free from our web site (see below), others are available via mail-order. This year we have greatly expanded the number of resources that we offer via mail-order. Most of these are books, but there are also some videos, bike stickers and other items. We keep prices to below or equal to normal retail, while including shipping within that price. At the moment, we have bike stickers in a dozen languages, yet the books are all in English. So this is something that could be improved in the future. This year we had a very successful book/magazine table at the Velo Mondiale conference, so we should do this at more conferences in the future. We have also been discussing with Detour Publications (a web-based transport book retailer) some possibilities for partnership. See pages 28-29 of Car Busters (magazine) no. 9, to see our current line of resources.

Web Site
This year we finally got a functioning web site together, and we plan to improve and expand it in the future, to provide useful information, resources and links. We plan to allow for on-line subscriptions and ordering in the future. Also, we’d like to provide different language versions of the site, which is now only in English, with a very poor Czech version (to be beautified and updated soon) and an Italian and Esperanto version in the works.

Publications
In 1999 we produced the ”Car Busters Graphics Book,” compiling the best transport-related graphics on file at Car Busters and making them available for free use by activists everywhere. We are currently finishing up a book of Andy Singer’s cartoons (titled ”CARtoons”). There may be other books or booklets produced in the future.

Conferences
We see it as our role to facilitate the organisation of ”Towards Car-Free Cities” conferences. So far there have been two. The first one was held in Lyon in 1997 (where Car Busters was launched). The second one occurred in Timisoara, Romania, in April 2000. They will probably continue to be held every two years, hosted by a different local group each time. 

Life in the Car Busters Office
Being a staff member (collective member) involves generally doing everything – editing the magazine, processing subscriptions and orders, editing and sometimes writing for the magazine, doing layout, fundraising, answering information requests from all over the world, and even cleaning the toilet. There's no hierarchy and no rules. Which means there's lots of space for new ideas and new approaches – if only you can convince the rest of the office! There are also no rules as to when people are in the office, or when they take holidays, although the position is considered to be full-time. Generally we manage to be inspired, committed and responsible enough that this isn't a problem. We tend not to specialise into position titles – we don’t have one person who’s responsible for processing subscriptions/orders and another who does layout. Rather, these roles are rotated or shared among us (although there are a few tasks done only by a single person, for practical reasons).
We tend to work independently most of the time, and informally ask questions or feedback on things as we work. We try to have a weekly office meeting where we can address important issues, make decisions, delegate tasks, find solutions to any problems found during the week, etc.
We feel strongly in maintaining a non-hierarchical workplace, in which each collective member has an equal say. Staff pay is equal for everyone, and we operate by consensus decision-making. There is no boss. We have a board of directors to satisfy the Czech law, but decisions in reality are made by the staff.
To give you an idea of what life in the office is like...
We have an office space that's about 20 m2, plus a hallway with a full bathroom and toilet, plus a kitchen and eating area shared with the Environmental Partnership. There's also a small balcony off their (adjoining) office, and outside is a backyard on a courtyard with an apple tree and a place for composting. We're located in a residential neighbourhood with lots of shops, an outdoor market area, and a metro station and a few tram lines. We're about 15 minutes from the centre of Prague. In the office we have three desks with networked PC computers, one phone, shelves holding our books and magazines, and various drawers containing our files. A large double window opens onto the street.
A sampling of typical tasks: answering information requests, processing orders/subscriptions, editing material submitted for the magazine, compiling information needed for a funding application, doing our monthly bookkeeping, boxing up some magazines, running off to the nearby post office, making lunch, researching information for an article, contacting groups to request information, writing up the monthly bulletin and confirming translators for it, producing a leaflet, updating the web site, bringing a print job to the printer, attempting to solve a computer problem, contacting a publisher to make a wholesale order, scanning a photo received from a contact, going to the bank to make a withdrawl and a bank transfer, contacting a distributor to request payment, sending a message to an e-mail listserve to request comment on an idea, cleaning up the layout on a nearly finished magazine page, searching for an information source to match an information request, watering our sole office plant, tidying up, taking out the compost, writing up a detailed description of Car Busters to give to people interested in joining our team...

Wages
Since we've been in the Czech Republic, all staff have been paid 5,000 CZK per month (plus up to 3,000 CZK for apartment rental). An average Czech salary is 10,000 CZK, for comparison -- and 8,000 CZK is equal to just over US$200. But don't let that shock you. We are in Eastern Europe here, and when you avoid the places with tourist prices and shop the way Czech people do, this amount allows you to live at a decent level. For example, a couple of us are living in a beautiful apartment formerly occupied by the financial secretary of the Egyptian embassy. Another comparison: a pint of beer can be had in a pub for 12 to 20 CZK, or US$0.30 to $0.50. A two-week public transport pass costs 280 CZK (cheaper for longer periods). For 2001, it looks like we will have enough funding to increase our pay a little.
Everyone is on a one-year contract which can be renewed -- if you do enough fundraising! We would love for people to stay longer than one year if things work out -- as one of our big organisational problems so far has been the annual turn-over of staff, which leaves new people somewhat dependent on Randy, who has been with Car Busters since the beginning. (All other staffers have been one year only.)
In order to satisfy our E.U. youth directorate funders, our staff have to "officially" be Europeans and under age 26, but we may get around that by having some people as declared "official" staff and others as "unofficial" off-the-books staff. If we take people from outside Europe, we will have to work with you to obtain visas and health insurance.

Who We’re Looking For
We’ll be taking three or four new people, and because these people will basically be running the project, they need to all be self-directed, motivated people whose skills will allow them to take on Car Busters projects “and run with them” (meaning taking a lot of personal initiative and control). No single person must have all of the following attributes, but we’re looking for people with strong English writing and editing skills, a sense of humour, publication layout skills, web design ability, an activist perspective, campaigning experience, attention to detail, extensive knowledge of transport issues, fundraising experience, and a desire to pull these all together to stir things up at the international level. Since Car Busters is a fluid, flexible, ever-changing organisation, projects and priorities will change to suit the desires and skills of the staff. So don’t feel intimidated by the above list – you may have other skills that will be just as valuable for us. Above all we need self-directed, motivated people who are comfortable working in an office environment (although we try not to be too ”officey”).

What We’d Like From You If You’re Interested
Please send your CV (resumé), responses to the following questions – and any quantity of obscure and/or sensible questions of your own – along with snap shots of your cat to Car Busters at Kratka 26, 100 00 Praha 10, Czech Republic or email carbusters@ecn.cz

QUESTIONS

The questions may sound a bit formal, but don't let that put you off. Just try to answer them informally and let your personality come out a bit...

MOTIVATION:

What do you want to learn and accomplish through your year with Car Busters? 
 
What are your motivations or interest in coming to join us?

EXPERIENCE:

Please describe in detail any NGO/activist experience you've had, especially within the alternative transport movement and those skills potentially useful working with Car Busters.

SKILLS:

Please describe any experience you have had of the following skills and at what level. Please add at the end any other skills you learned through activist and other work that would contribute to Car Busters (based on what you know from reading the above).

Fundraising (applications and funder reports)
 
Computer (programs, Mac/IBM, etc.)
 
Database use

Desktop publishing and layout

Outreach (ie publicising a project, building links with other groups)

Writing articles/information leaflets

Office organisation eg bookkeeping, filing

Responding to information requests

COOPERATION/TEAM WORK:

Briefly, what are your past experiences with team work and cooperation?
 
With consensus decision-making? Do you think you function well and participate fully in a non-hierarchical environment?

WORKING STYLE:

How would you describe your level of self-direction or ability to carry out tasks independently? 

Can you handle not having a boss? 
 
Have you ever worked full-time in an office environment before? 

Did this working environment create problems for you?
 
Was it productive/efficient?

LOGISTICAL QUESTIONS:

When can you start?
 
Would you consider working longer than a year if money is available?

LANGUAGES:

What is your level of reading, writing and speaking in each of your languages?
 
What is your experience, if any, with translation? Between what languages?

PROJECTS OF INTEREST:

What existing, new or proposed projects at CarBusters are you interested in working on? Why? 

Do you have other project ideas for Car Busters?