When the first lockdown began, one of the biggest changes was that the roads were suddenly emptied of cars.

In fact, government data shows that the pandemic has had the biggest single-year impact on road traffic since records began in 1949.

Teachers still working in schools no doubt saw the benefit of this with quick and easy commutes, while many key worker parents took advantage of the quieter streets to walk their children in.

“We heard from our parents that they had chosen to walk because they felt safer with less cars on the road,” explains a headteacher of a secondary school in Yorkshire.

However, this term, with normality being pushed by the government, the car has returned with a vengeance. Data from TomTom reveals that the number of cars on the road is creeping back up to pre-pandemic levels.

And with cars back, so are the parking woes: “Now lockdown is over there are just as many cars as before and we’re getting angry phone calls and emails from residents about parking again,” says the headteacher.

COP26: The benefits of pupils walking to school

Of course, upset local residents aren’t the only problem that headteachers face when it comes to traffic - there are serious safety concerns, too, as the guide School Site Road Safety from the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents makes clear.

The guide cites data from a report published by the Department for Transport showing that most child casualties in traffic accidents happen during the school run hours of 8-9am and 3-4pm. 

And not only is it a problem linked to the time of the school day, but also the proximity to the school. The AXA RoadSafe School Report reveals that every month 1,200 children are injured in a traffic-related collision within 500 metres of a school.

And even schools without a history of traffic accidents need to pay attention to the roads, because although Ofsted won’t be checking up on the number of cars, you can expect it to ask for evidence that you’re monitoring the situation.

“We don’t have a role in monitoring traffic management at the schools we inspect,” an Ofsted spokesperson says. “However, if there are significant concerns that impact the safety of those using or visiting the school grounds and the nearby area, inspectors would want to see that measures are in place to prevent any serious accidents.”

As well as accident prevention, air pollution caused by traffic is also a big issue with a quarter of all UK schools recording levels of air pollution above the World Health Organisation guidelines. 

Cutting down air pollution around schools

So school leaders need to manage traffic in order to keep everyone safe and healthy, ensure good relations with their local community and keep Ofsted happy, too - not an easy task.

However, how much power does a school have over the traffic and driving habits of its parents? Appeals in the school newsletter and emails are obvious but asking for more considerate parking or extolling walking will only go so far.

When these polite requests have been exhausted, more action is necessary.

So where do you start? Many will go straight in with strategies for a pro-walking and anti-driving campaign. This would address the problem and has the clear aim of getting cars away from the school gates.

But before you can come up with a plan of action there needs to be an assessment of the journey you’re asking parents to walk. One approach is to run a Community Route Audit (CRA), as recommended by the charity Living Streets.

Stephen Edwards is chief executive of the charity, which supports schools through its work with the Department for Transport. He says a CRA looks an awful lot like a normal walk to school - but you do it with your “problem spotting” glasses on.

“We walk the local streets with parents and teachers to see the barriers they’re experiencing on a day-to-day basis,” says Edwards.

Those barriers could be a road where dangerous parking makes it hard to cross safely, or streets where cars are driving too quickly.

Following the CRA, the school provides recommendations to improve the area to the local authority. This might be additional street lighting or repairs to speed bumps. Leaders can do this by either speaking directly to the transport team or by going through local councillors.

The recommendations from the audit alone could be enough to tackle the problem.

Banning cars?

However, you might feel you need to consider a stronger option: banning vehicles from the school altogether.

This may sound extreme but it is something schools can request to do by enacting something called a “School Street” - an initiative that has been in place since 2017 and that is growing in popularity. 

Sustrans is a charity that helps schools with their applications for School Streets. It says that back in 2019 it supported 40 schools -today, the number has grown to over 400.

So what exactly does a School Street entail? It’s when the road immediately outside of the school is temporarily restricted to only pedestrians and cyclists for an hour at drop-off, and for two hours at pick-up. 

The School Street zone is enforced using barriers or collapsible bollards, and there are signs to inform drivers of the restrictions. Vehicles are not allowed to enter the School Street zone during the times of operation unless they are registered for an exemption (such as residents, employees of the school and people with disabilities).

Enforcing the School Street can be tricky. After all, if parents have been used to driving the journey, suddenly taking away that option might be met with resistance.

However, schools can get help enforcing this by using automatic number plate reader (ANPR) cameras, and drivers who ignore the rules can be issued with a fixed penalty charge.

This is already in place in London and Wales and from 2022, the law is changing, so all schools in England may request that cameras be installed.

How to implement a School Street 

If, then, you think a School Street would work in your community, where do you start in your application to get one?

Edwards says the power to introduce a School Street lies with the local authority, and so the responsibility is down to the headteacher to make the argument for why it’s the right choice for their school.

“To set up a School Street you would need to work with the wider community: your parents, residents and others to make the case for a School Street,” he says. “Then you work with your local councillor to put your case together.”

Of course, it isn’t as simple as putting your application in and the next day the barriers appear. The council will usually first run a trial of the School Street for around six months with an experimental traffic management order.

If your School Street goes to consultation and is approved by the council, this is converted to a permanent order.

Trial runs

Of course, this is a big undertaking and taking such a drastic step may put many schools off because they are worried about getting into confrontation with parents or making their lives harder.

In this instance, perhaps a street closure trial would be better, allowing the community to see what it would be like as a one-off?

That was the approach that Brookburn Primary School in Manchester took, as deputy head Emily Henderson and PTA member Layla Siebert explain.

“We haven’t been allowed to put in a permanent School Street, so instead we have applied for an Article 16 temporary road closure,” Siebert explains. 

An Article 16 road closure is ordinarily used for street parties or festivals. The school used this to close the road outside its gates for a day and turn it into a ”Play Street” and children used the space to ride bikes and play games.

Although they’ve not been able to set up a School Street straight away, Henderson says having the chance to trial a road closure has given them an opportunity to really sell the change to the parents.

“The reaction has been awesome,” says Henderson. “Parents say they want it every day, children are more relaxed and we have more children cycling or walking to school.”

Edwards says this is a good strategy to take. “Once you’ve had a trial people can see how it works in practice and experience the real difference it makes on a day-to-day basis,” he says. “That allows them to see those benefits in action and then hopefully It persuades them positively that this can work at their school.”

For some schools, though, the option of a School Street or even temporary closure might not be necessary or viable. This might be because you haven’t got enough parent support or the geographical location just doesn’t allow for it.

Promote a walking culture 

So what other options do these schools have for making their roads safer?

One option is to create a wider culture of promoting walking and cycling to school. It could have more of an impact than you may think.

For example, a survey by Sustrans reveals that although a third of parents drive, only half of that number actually want to. So how can you help them make the switch?

Strategies for rural schools where pupils travel long distances too far or dangerous to walk, or where public transport is limited or poorly linked might struggle to persuade parents to walk.

In these cases, “Park and Stride” could be a good option. Similar to park-and-ride schemes, pupils are driven to a designated car park, but instead of hopping onto a bus, they complete their journey on foot.

For a school like Intake Primary School in Sheffield, “Park and Stride”, using a car park five minutes’ walk away, was the best option because of their school’s location.

“We’re on a busy main road with a bus stop outside - so it is really important for us to make it safe for the children first thing in the morning,” says Lisa Reid, headteacher of the school.

Reid adds that this is also a great way to help boost the health of pupils, especially after lockdown and the effects of being inside for so much longer. 

“We want to promote every initiative we can to get our learners moving, as for our children, if they’re active it is the best set-up for learning,” she adds.

And if “Park and Stride” feels like a step too far, at first you could get involved with a walking challenge, like Walk to School Week and see how the community reacts.

Edwards says these initiatives are surprisingly effective, and on average schools report a 23 per cent increase in walking after the first five weeks of set up - and continued monitoring by schools shows that this figure is often sustained even years after the challenge is first brought in.

The importance of good communication

Sustaining the success of whatever strategy you introduce, whether that’s a road closure or a walking initiative, relies upon getting the communications right, say Siebert and Henderson. And by “right” they mean “inclusive and consistent”.

“You need to keep people on-side,” they say. “Include those who live in the local community but don’t have children at the school. It’s a team effort rather than something you do in isolation.”

So how do you convince people to join your team? Siebert and Henderson say they made sure their message wasn’t “anti-car” and instead focused on who it was open to. “We went door-knocking, putting posters up on streetlamps, hung banners with dates of when the closures were happening with contact details asking for feedback.”

As a result of adopting this strategy for communication, people felt like they had been informed - and this matters because then they are more likely to be supportive, they say.

Reid agrees and adds that the key to success is relentless positivity.

“To make it work you need constant promotion and constant reminders,” she says. “Because there is always so much else going on at school, your initiative can get forgotten among everything else.”

Of course, for all these good ideas there is one issue we haven’t touched on: the great British weather. 

After all, in the summer months walking to school is an easy sell but on cold, wet and dark mornings it’s easy to see why car use might come creeping back up again. However, Reid has a secret weapon: the children.

“If you can convince the children of the benefits, you’re more than halfway there,” she says. “We started with our school council to get children on board - we used recent news stories, taught them about pollution - and the result is children who want to be active.”

Reid says this gives them ‘pester power”. She says she knows, as a parent herself, that if your children are pestering you to walk, you’re more likely to leave the car at home.

And that’s how this battle will be won - one journey at a time.

Useful contacts

• Mums For Lungs
• Sustrans
• Living Streets
• TfL STAR scheme
• Bike is Best