Advocacy through Public Education:
Illinois Tollway “Give Them Distance” Campaign
Challenge:
When an Illinois Tollway worker was killed by a semi-truck while carrying out a service to improve travel and safety for customers, Morreale recommended developing a new safety campaign to bring attention to the lifesaving Move Over Law that had recently been expanded to protect the everyday driver, emergency personal and roadway workers.
Our challenge was to develop that campaign designed to save lives by educating drivers using a regular, strategic cadence of digital, social and traditional media driving home the importance of the Move Over Law.
Solution:
On behalf of the Illinois Tollway, Morreale engaged with our audience to develop a campaign designed to save lives by educating drivers using a regular, strategic cadence of digital, social and traditional media driving home the importance of the Move Over Law.
Highlights:
We tapped opinion leaders to join our cause and publicly share their support by pledging to Give Them Distance. We built a coalition of public and private sector leaders to champion our message.
Partnering with driver education associations, we shared materials with more than 700 classrooms across the state.
Our advocacy day at the Illinois State Capitol resulted in an executive proclamation and dozens of lawmakers who took the pledge.
Result:
The campaign was successful because it was interactive, collaborative and built on strong messaging and branding. Give Them Distance garnered media coverage from every major outlet in Chicagoland and received placement in every region of the state of Illinois, including Springfield, Carbondale and St. Louis.
“Give Them Distance Public Service Announcement” garnered more than 65K organic social media views and 856 shares on Facebook alone. Major household names like ABC 7’s Roz Varon, Bears Quarterback Mitch Trubisky, NHL Great Bobby Hull, and NBC 5’s Kye Martin took the pledge.
More than 700 classrooms across Illinois implemented Give Them Distance curriculum to their classrooms by tapping established educational partnerships.
In 2020, this educational series won the ACEC Illinois Excellence in Engineering Award for a Special Project in Studies, Research and Consulting.
