The current rules are that children aged 8 and over are only entitled to free school travel if they live more than 3 miles (about 5km) away. Yet in the planning process for new developments adults are generally expected to walk 2km and cycle 5km.
How is it that 8 year olds are expected to walk over twice as far as adults? In reality it results in children being driven to school.
This petition asks for a change so that the 3 mile still applies but anyone more than 2km (circa 1.25km) away should be able to cycle for a significant portion of the route.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/224790
Feel free to share on your social media.
The following goes into a bit more detail for those that are interested, but feel free to move on to something else at this point.
In the UK we often have a lot of good things which are provided by the government, like the NHS which turned 70 this year. However from time to time there are some things which aren't so well thought out.
For instance, within our planning process there's guidance which states that upto 2km is suitable for most people to walk to get somewhere, with distances upto 5km being the distance where people are expected to cycle. However when it comes to school children having free bus travel the safe walking distance is 2 miles for those aged 8 and under and 3 miles for secondary (which is effectively 5 km).
3 miles would take about an hour walk, which means that some 11 year olds may not be getting home until about 4pm (depending on end of school times). If they were to attend an after school club then this could be getting on for 5pm or later (also depending on how long the club lasts for). Given that the school holidays are mostly focused during the summer months this then means that for much of the school year these children, especially those who want to broaden their experiences by attending after school clubs, could be walking to and from school in the dark.
For those in the South this walking to and from School, however the further north you live the more the children will be waking to school during dark mornings and home again during dark evenings.
Whilst this is fairly illogically if viewed in isolation, however it gets even more stupid if there are younger/older siblings involved and their school is not located near the school for which this assessment is being made for.
Compare this with a 3 mile cycle ride, which would likely take about 20 minutes. This would remove several trips a year when the children are traveling in the dark. It would also give the children more time to be able to focus on their homework as well allowing them to attend more extracurricular activities (after school clubs, swimming lessons, football, Scouts/Guides, etc.) which would result in more rounded children.
To provide scope to undertake these activities it is likely that children would be driven to/from school. Especially given the definition of a safe route is that one which is safe when parents are accompanying their children, which means that those parents could be walking 12 miles a day, resulting in them walking for about 4 hours. Few parents are going to do that over driving, especially those who have other commitments like work and/or other children.
As such I have started a petition to call on the government to look at changing the rules so that any school child which needs to travel more than 2km (about 1.25 miles) should be able to have a safe cycle route for a significant portion of their route to school. This would also mean that the whole route would need to be suitable to push a cycle along whilst not on a cycling section of the route. Rather than the current rules where it's a safe walking route.
This may not sound like a big change, but it could have a big difference in the lives of some school children.
It could even encourage parents who currently drive their children to school to allow them to cycle to school on their own, which could in turn help tackle childhood obesity and reduce the numbers of cars at the school gates and the benefits that would bring.
It would likely also bring wider benefits in that there would likely need to be more safe cycle routes within the vicinity of schools which could mean less cars on the roads as more people cycle. Even if you want to drive you should support better cycle provission as it would mean less traffic congestion for you as people leave their car behind in favour of cycling.
Now for most schools this isn't going to impact many children as most schools are built in urban settings. However there are some cases where the school is located in one location for historic reasons, yet a nearby settlement had grown much bigger.
As an example Robert Mays school is located in Odiham Hampshire, where Odiham has a population of about 4,500. This compares to Hook (circa 2.5 miles to 3.3 miles away) which had a population of 8,000 and is likely to grow to above 10,000 in the next five years.
Based on the number of children in each year at primary age in the Hook schools it is likely that about 50% of Robert Mays children could come from Hook (circa 600, the current pupils have free bus travel due to the route being unsafe to walk, but this could change). That's potentially a lot of children who could be disadvantaged in their childhood due to having to walk long distances to school if there was a change to the walking route which made it safe.
For those who are driven that's a lot of extra traffic or onto the roads causing congestion and parking issues.
However this is just an example and for every child for whom is disadvantaged by this imbalance in government policy it can be difficult and therefore I ask if you would sign the petition to get the government to review their rules.
There's likely to be an impact on local authorities as this is brought in, and so it is entirely likely that it would need to be phased in.
However given the length of time that school travel plans have been brought forward it is likely that the impact could be fairly minimal overall to start with if the percentage cyclable starts fairly low and then increases over time. Especially if there was guidance on how busy roads are for them to be considered as safe, as this could allow a lot of residential roads to be part of the safe cycling route.
Thank you for your time and I hope you sign the petition and pass the message on so others can sign it.
How is it that 8 year olds are expected to walk over twice as far as adults? In reality it results in children being driven to school.
This petition asks for a change so that the 3 mile still applies but anyone more than 2km (circa 1.25km) away should be able to cycle for a significant portion of the route.
https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/224790
Feel free to share on your social media.
The following goes into a bit more detail for those that are interested, but feel free to move on to something else at this point.
In the UK we often have a lot of good things which are provided by the government, like the NHS which turned 70 this year. However from time to time there are some things which aren't so well thought out.
For instance, within our planning process there's guidance which states that upto 2km is suitable for most people to walk to get somewhere, with distances upto 5km being the distance where people are expected to cycle. However when it comes to school children having free bus travel the safe walking distance is 2 miles for those aged 8 and under and 3 miles for secondary (which is effectively 5 km).
3 miles would take about an hour walk, which means that some 11 year olds may not be getting home until about 4pm (depending on end of school times). If they were to attend an after school club then this could be getting on for 5pm or later (also depending on how long the club lasts for). Given that the school holidays are mostly focused during the summer months this then means that for much of the school year these children, especially those who want to broaden their experiences by attending after school clubs, could be walking to and from school in the dark.
For those in the South this walking to and from School, however the further north you live the more the children will be waking to school during dark mornings and home again during dark evenings.
Whilst this is fairly illogically if viewed in isolation, however it gets even more stupid if there are younger/older siblings involved and their school is not located near the school for which this assessment is being made for.
Compare this with a 3 mile cycle ride, which would likely take about 20 minutes. This would remove several trips a year when the children are traveling in the dark. It would also give the children more time to be able to focus on their homework as well allowing them to attend more extracurricular activities (after school clubs, swimming lessons, football, Scouts/Guides, etc.) which would result in more rounded children.
To provide scope to undertake these activities it is likely that children would be driven to/from school. Especially given the definition of a safe route is that one which is safe when parents are accompanying their children, which means that those parents could be walking 12 miles a day, resulting in them walking for about 4 hours. Few parents are going to do that over driving, especially those who have other commitments like work and/or other children.
As such I have started a petition to call on the government to look at changing the rules so that any school child which needs to travel more than 2km (about 1.25 miles) should be able to have a safe cycle route for a significant portion of their route to school. This would also mean that the whole route would need to be suitable to push a cycle along whilst not on a cycling section of the route. Rather than the current rules where it's a safe walking route.
This may not sound like a big change, but it could have a big difference in the lives of some school children.
It could even encourage parents who currently drive their children to school to allow them to cycle to school on their own, which could in turn help tackle childhood obesity and reduce the numbers of cars at the school gates and the benefits that would bring.
It would likely also bring wider benefits in that there would likely need to be more safe cycle routes within the vicinity of schools which could mean less cars on the roads as more people cycle. Even if you want to drive you should support better cycle provission as it would mean less traffic congestion for you as people leave their car behind in favour of cycling.
Now for most schools this isn't going to impact many children as most schools are built in urban settings. However there are some cases where the school is located in one location for historic reasons, yet a nearby settlement had grown much bigger.
As an example Robert Mays school is located in Odiham Hampshire, where Odiham has a population of about 4,500. This compares to Hook (circa 2.5 miles to 3.3 miles away) which had a population of 8,000 and is likely to grow to above 10,000 in the next five years.
Based on the number of children in each year at primary age in the Hook schools it is likely that about 50% of Robert Mays children could come from Hook (circa 600, the current pupils have free bus travel due to the route being unsafe to walk, but this could change). That's potentially a lot of children who could be disadvantaged in their childhood due to having to walk long distances to school if there was a change to the walking route which made it safe.
For those who are driven that's a lot of extra traffic or onto the roads causing congestion and parking issues.
However this is just an example and for every child for whom is disadvantaged by this imbalance in government policy it can be difficult and therefore I ask if you would sign the petition to get the government to review their rules.
There's likely to be an impact on local authorities as this is brought in, and so it is entirely likely that it would need to be phased in.
However given the length of time that school travel plans have been brought forward it is likely that the impact could be fairly minimal overall to start with if the percentage cyclable starts fairly low and then increases over time. Especially if there was guidance on how busy roads are for them to be considered as safe, as this could allow a lot of residential roads to be part of the safe cycling route.
Thank you for your time and I hope you sign the petition and pass the message on so others can sign it.
