The Challenge
Speeding is not simply a traffic violation; it is a decision that can change or end a life in seconds. The New York City Department of Transportation entrusted us with expanding the reach and impact of its Vision Zero initiative and making one urgent message impossible to ignore: slow down, lives depend on it. Our assignment went beyond placing a traditional public safety campaign. We needed to reach New Yorkers across the moments and environments that shape how they move through the city, extending our reach to young drivers, families, pedestrians, moped riders, and audiences across all five boroughs.
The Approach
Working closely with the DOT Commissioner and his team, we developed an evolving media strategy that reached New Yorkers throughout their daily journeys: in their homes, phones, cars, neighborhoods, and commutes. As the campaign shifted from “Speeding Ruins Lives” to “You Can’t Rewind a Crash,” we used performance data from each flight to refine targeting, optimize investment, and identify new opportunities across TV, radio, digital, programmatic, OOH, gaming platforms, and community media. We also built a major sports partnership platform with seven iconic New York teams (the Knicks, Nets, Yankees, Mets, Liberty, NYCFC, and Staten Island FerryHawks), moving the message into the cultural experiences New Yorkers already know, trust, and care about.
The Results
Across multiple campaign flights, the work generated over 1.3 billion impressions, reached millions of sports fans, and expanded the campaign into communities and environments often overlooked by traditional traffic safety advertising. We transformed Vision Zero from a message people encountered into one that traveled with them throughout the city, making slowing down part of New York's broader conversation.
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