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Original poster

How long is your primary childs journey to school?

73 replies

Camomila · 06/02/2021 07:04

Am up with the baby and idly browsing rightmove.

There's no way we'll ever be able to afford to buy somewhere in walking distance of DS1s (amazing) primary school.
Is half an hour/45min on public transport a bit much? With occassional lifts from DH and me learning to drive asap?

(No worries about getting DS2 in as siblings are higher priority than distance).

OP posts:
IndecentFeminist · 06/02/2021 07:48

About a 3 minute walk

Princesspickle777 · 06/02/2021 07:50

We’re quite rural. The school DC’s attend is our closest catchment school out of the two. It’s an 8 minute drive or a 30 minute walk. We do tend to walk more in the warmer months but drive in winter. One of the pathways we have to walk down is a bog in winter.

BatleyTownswomensGuild · 06/02/2021 07:51

3 mins walk door to door. You can hear the kids in the playground from our garden.

Definitely wouldn't want a 45min commute. In early years they get incredibly tired after school. It would be a long old day for them.

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shivbo2014 · 06/02/2021 07:53

2 minute walk, the school is on our road.

MotherExtraordinaire · 06/02/2021 08:04

Where we are, noone lives more than 15 minutes walk away from the primary school.
Secondaries are buses and anything from a 645am bus to 8am bus from here to get to school for 830 start, depending which attend.
I wouldn't want to send my child to a primary that they couldn't walk home to and from. It's imo really important for a sense of community and social development. Seeing their little friends on the way and back, playing in the park, are really significant at that age.

EventuallyDeleted · 06/02/2021 08:04

Less than 10 mins walk, which meant they could walk to and from with friends, go to each others houses after school easily, stay for after school clubs (a lot of the clubs were specific to years or suits one DC but not the other so I would go back an hour later for the second). It also meant they were in the same Brownies, swimming lessons etc as their friends as all were local (small catchment area).

Have you checked the admission criteria carefully? Ours is

Sibling in catchment
Catchment
Sibling outside catchment
Outside catchment

Doublechins · 06/02/2021 08:05

We live next door so not only can they walk but they can walk themselves 👌

EventuallyDeleted · 06/02/2021 08:05

It also meant that years after they have left I have got a group of mum friends right on the doorstep, handy for nights out (well not at the moment).

dandelionbayts · 06/02/2021 08:18

A 10 min drive. I did a 30 min drive to nursery everyday though and whilst DS was fine, I really hated it towards the end of the year tbh it wasn't worth it.

Firefliess · 06/02/2021 08:47

I had to move house to get more space so ended up about 30 minutes travel from school. It was enough of a pain that I ended up moving DD to a closer school in the middle of Y3. She has also been missing out on playdates as parents were happy to arrange them with others who were local but less keen to run their child to our from ours.

Waxonwaxoff0 · 06/02/2021 08:55

Ours is a 30 minute walk and we walk every day as I don't drive. We don't find it tiring.

bubblebubblebubbletrouble · 06/02/2021 09:01

5 mins in the car about 1/2hr walk.
Be careful of admission criteria. Ours changed after dd1 started (undersubscribed when I chose the school)
to catchment siblings/catchment/siblings. We were the last year of the grace period so they had catchment siblings/siblings/catchment for 2 years but it was still a slightly anxious wait eyeing up siblings in the playground to figure out what year they would be 🤣😂

irishgal85 · 06/02/2021 09:05

6/7 mins in the car

actiongirl1978 · 06/02/2021 09:11

14 miles, 24 minutes exactly. We live rurally so this is fast roads and no traffic jams.

No way I'd do it if I had to wait for a bus or stand in the rain.

IMissFrance · 06/02/2021 10:34

6/7 minutes in the car (steep hill with no path and it's on the way to my place of work which is a further 15 in the same direction) and then we park further from the school so I'm on the right road for when I get back in the car to get to work. So then it's about a 5 minute walk to school from there.

xyzandabc · 06/02/2021 10:42

20/25 min walk around a mile but was only a 10 min walk when they all started at the school. We moved further out when youngest was in yr1.

If I was moving 45 mins away from primary school, the kids would move school to a more local one.

If it's public transport, does that mean you'd be doing a 90 minute round trip twice a day with a younger sibling in tow? So youngest spends 3 hours a day just on the school run. That's really not sustainable in the long run.

If your eldest only had a year or 2 left, then I'd suck it up and find a closer school for dc2. If eldest is under 9, I'd just move schools.

iveturnedintoachip · 06/02/2021 10:42

4 min walk, bliss!

Equimum · 06/02/2021 10:43

Don’t forget to factor in time for getting everyone in and out of the car on days you use it. Our school run is a ten minute drive, but I always allow nearer 20 as it takes a while to get everyone in and out of the car, and to do the same with multiple bags, lunchboxes and all the other stuff we have.

mnahmnah · 06/02/2021 10:44

5-10 minute walk. It makes ten whole school experience so much easier. Parents evenings, summer and Christmas fairs, open evenings, sports day. No worry about getting there on time, parking. It also means they live walking distance form most of their friends. It feels like a real community you are part of.

Beetlewing · 06/02/2021 10:51

20 mins. Last school was 40 minute walk away and we didn't have a car. It was VERY far on little legs, especially on hot afternoons

jennymac31 · 06/02/2021 11:15

Our school journey is roughly 30 minutes door-to-door; 5 minutes walk to bus stop, 10 minute bus ride then 15 minutes walk (we could stay on the bus for an extra 10 minutes to school but kids like the walk). The admission distances in our area are so small that we were outside our 3 closest schools despite them being a 10-15 minute walk so we put our school as our 1st preference as its close to our offices (didn't want to take the risk of being allocated a random school miles away from our home or work). Don't have any regrets with our school choices.

jennymac31 · 06/02/2021 11:21

Forgot to mention that as there were a few families in our local area in the same predicament, my DC have friends just round the corner who also go to the same city centre school.

mindutopia · 06/02/2021 11:37

10 minute drive. Yes, I would think 45 minutes on public transport would be too long. Also what about you? Won’t you have other things you need to do with your day? I couldn’t imagine spending 3 hours a day just doing the school run.

MTBer2021 · 06/02/2021 11:40

Exactly 1 mile on the route we walk.

MTBer2021 · 06/02/2021 11:43

Cautionary note OP, admission criteria can and do change quickly. In our town it happened relatively recently and now catchment / distance get priority over siblings and meant younger siblings not getting places and older ones having to move. Some won appeals but plenty didn't.