How to broach this school run traffic problem

[JenniferBooth]

i live opposite an infant/junior school. For the last 29 years. The traffic is a nightmare. Has been steadily getting worse over the last five years particularly the last two. Todays normally ten min bus journey at 3.30pm took TWENTY FIVE minutes. The bus driver could see that the three cars in front of him had ONE parent and ONE child in it. Ludicrous. Been living here 29 years and it never used to be like this. Im going to ring the Head and ask him if he can ask the parents to carpool or something. But ive already been told this is a stupid idea so what do i do.

Parent Parker's are generally wankers. There's a huge free car park 250m from Dts school and they still block the roads to get as close as they can. Entitlement personified

I live near a school. I don't think you can make it change. Your best bet would be to approach your local councillors to see what might be possible.

Too many parents are really strapped for time going to/from work.

Car pooling probably isn't that realistic of a solution. We walk DD1 to school, but if we drove, we wouldn't be able to car pool easily. We'd have to remove DD2's car seat and base (she's at nursery), get the other child's car seat/booster seat (whatever they use) and swap round whenever the children were going in a different car. So would we buy a spare car seat to go in someone else's car for DD1 to use, or would we end up with our car seat in someone else's car after she's been dropped at school and we're then stuck without it so wouldn't be able to do pick up. Young children can't just hop into someone else's car when they need to be in the right size car seat.

Ask your council for a LTN?

It was only a suggestion. We don't know the exact layout etc.

Yes why is this a childfree issue?

The next bus stop is presumably a little less busy though, because the parents will have spread out a bit in whatever directions they're going rather than being very concentrated in one area.

However the bus would still be late.

I live a ten minute walk from school but have to drive as I go straight to work. Same as most other mums and dad.

No it wouldnt be less busy The estate is circular That is why the bus is the ** Road circular.

The parents could spread out but that would mean driving through peoples houses and into their living rooms

Our school now open the gates 10 mins early so there's a 10 mins window for people arriving. Yes, it drags out the time because a few people are arriving in car from 5-10 mins before that, and it takes til 5 past bell to be completely clear as some people stand and chat or are late. BUT, traffic flows much easier during that time. It's not bumper to bumper of parked cars meaning cars aren't getting trapped and someone needing to use pavement (terrifying for pedestrians!). It's so much safer for kids /families who are walking up the road.
of course it does mean that the school needs supervisors in playground for those 10 minutes but I'd happily contribute extra to school fund to keep that going.
i wonder if that might be a possible suggestion to school?

stargazer thankyou Hadnt thought of that

Our school has a 15 minute opening to register time gap that helps lessen the pressure of drop offs

I used to have do drop off my daughter at a childminder at 8am and then drive to work and then school pick up at 3.20, leaving work at 2.45. Timings were tight and I did not have time to drop the car at home and walk down, even though it was probably a 7 minute walk. I did park a distance away though and never joined in the crap parking around the schools.

DD walked herself home from end of year 5 and it was lovely not to have to do the school run anymore.

Now in Y9 and have only been to school for parents evening and I walked .

The increase in traffic is because more households need both parents to work.

Hence they are generally in cars.

It's not fun the school run you know people don't do it once their child finishes school. Little ones can't walk on their own.

Yes you can ask the Head to suggest carpooling but realistically it's not going to happen unless their journeys are identical.

If the cars are using the roads legally there is absolutely nothing you or the head can do. Not even the police.

You could ask the school if there is somewhere you could keep a bicycle on their grounds perhaps.

One parent and one child means two passengers that is double most cars.

Get a book. Enjoy the extra 15 minutes reading. Find some podcasts, watch the world go by. You need to change your mindset about this situation. You are going to be stuck in the bus for an extra 15 minutes most school days.

Most people's commute is longer than 25 minutes you are quite lucky really.

As much as we all want the roads to ourselves that just doesn't happen if the roads are clear I can do a circular drop and back to school in 17 minutes but when there are other cars on the road going to work/school and the annoying buses which are so slow changing lanes and at roundabouts it takes 45 minutes so a greater increase than your 15 minutes and I have to do the driving I can't even read. All those other bloody people going places they have to the roads should be just for me me me......

There's your answer parents can't use buses to get between home, school and work in time.

How do you get from school at 8.50 to work at 9, many breakfast clubs closed after Covid so parents are stuck.

Why havent they re opened the breakfast clubs Covid has been used as an excuse to get rid of a lot of things

I would imagine a lack of funding, gov keeps saying there’s no magic money tree except when they want to bail out their mates/donors then they can find any amount. Breakfast clubs require staff and food.

Annoying. But. Mortgages need two salaries. Mum's work (always the mum) eyebrow raise at her 'just in time' arrival, because 'she just needs to be more organised'. You'd love her to walk to school, yes, but then she'd have to walk home and then get in her car and often drive past that school on her flustered, frantic way to her work.

Don't blame her, blame the inflexibility of employers, a system that requires we outsource all childcare on the altar of £ productivity.

A school near me has a layby nearby and the parents can drop there and then there is a walking bus that goes to the school. I'd definitely suggest talking to your local councilors and see if they can support you.

I feel your pain. My son isnt at the nearest school to me because he has some additional needs. I drive past it though to get to his school and it's getting worse and worse. If parents just parked in the supermarket over the road or on the council estate the other side of the school rather than on the posher road it would make a big difference

What a rude response when @underneaththeash was offering a perfectly reasonable suggestion. Even if you were still stuck in traffic at the next bus stop, presumably it still cuts down the length of your journey considerably. Even if not, how about not being so rude to someone just trying to help?

The parents don’t love the situation either. But this is a normal problem near a school. It might ease up in a few weeks, but the parents aren’t going take the local residents into consideration. I park on a street next to my kids school. I know it’s annoying for the residents, but if you live near a school you have to expect there will be crazy traffic a couple of times a day.

I drop my child to school by car - I could walk but then I would start my working day later and have to finish it earlier and I'd rather have that time with my child. I'm as entitled to use the roads as anyone else and being a parent doesn't make my time any less valuable or my commute any less onerous. I'm still working.

I considered but deliberately did not buy a house next to a school due to the parking issues/ delay of leaving the house at school run times. With mothers expected by society to work full time children being driven to school is as much due to time pressures as "laziness".

My daughter goes to a school that has been on that site since Victorian times so my view in anyone living by the school has chosen to live there, it's not a new issue. When my mother moved house next to a huge school traffic bottle neck (4 schools in a half mile stretch of main road), she knew she would face traffic jams at school run times but as a pensioner accepted she wasn't going to be trying to go to work for 9am and bought the house anyway.

Even in a housing association property you have some control over where you live as it's possible to do mutual exchanges of properties.

There's a bus route that goes past DS' school (village type area). For a while a double decker was scheduled to pass at pick up time. It was absolute chaos when the bus tried to get through, and frankly, dangerous. The bus company changed the timings, problem solved (they later cancelled the route altogether, but that's another story).
Maybe appeal to the council and the bus company to do that. The bus isn't running on time anyway, so if it were later it wouldn't be a problem.