To ignore the school parking diktat?

[Ginmakesitallok]

I drive to drop off andpick kids up from school - too far to walk and on my way to work. Its busy, but i usually get a space in the street beside school.

Theres a note in a recent school newsletter to say that parents shouldn't drive into this street, that there's no parking for parents there and that the yellow lines are for kids safety.

Now - it's a public road, no restricted parking, only yellow lines are at junctions where I'd never park. Surely the school can't think that it can stop parents parking where they want if they are parking legally??

I haven't read all the replies OP but I think you might be a parent from my DDs school. Let's say central Scotland?
If I'm right, I live in the street that the school have asked people not to park in. Me and my neighbour have dropped kerbs and driveways and it doesn't stop people from parking over and obstructing the drives. We often let our friends use our drives and at least once a week they can't get in because of the issues. I have no problem with parents parking in the street, but they are not parking considerably.
We are so sick of it that we have spoken to the police and they have advised us to start taking number plates, especially for repeat offenders and report them, which we will do.

Same at the school at the end of our road. It has a tiny catchment area as there are only 8 classes.
Parents block drives, speed down the street ignoring the 20mph signs, park on the speed bumps installed to slow traffic as there is A SCHOOL at the end of the street. If you ask them to move, you are subject to abuse., or told 'I pay my road tax I can park were I like'

My lovely neighbours was sworn at and threatened by a parent who sat In the car gossiping with her friend for over half an hour. Neighbour called the police who gave the parent a warning.
They even use the residents parking bays for visitors which we actually part own as residents in the street. We pay for their upkeep. One morning a neighbour got their fence replaced and the fencing firm parked over 3 of the bays as the fence was adjacent to the spaces. Parents complained in the playground about the 'school parking spaces' bring blocked. They don't belong to the school !

Some parents are fine and park legally but there are many who simply don't.

Pollution around schools has reached crazy levels over the past few years, resulting in increased levels of asthma in children. Is that not enough to make people not want to drive/park near schools?

School run cars, most of which are driven by women, account for about 20% of cars on the road in rush hour in term-time. Everyone goes mad about them. The 80% of cars, which are doing other stuff and are driven equally by men or women (probably slightly more men) are ignored.

The 80% are generally not blocking people's drives (which is bad) or putting the lives of children at risk (which is worse) - many more of the 20 % are.

Pollution around schools has reached crazy levels over the past few years, resulting in increased levels of asthma in children. Is that not enough to make people not want to drive/park near schools?

No, but it's enough to make them want other people not to drive/park near schools!

She (and you) clearly do not care about the safety aspect which has been raised numerous times

Oh I love AIBU threads, where the overwhelming response is "yes" and OP won't have any of it 😂😂😂
Why bother posting if you aren't going to take on board what others are saying
Yes OP you are BVU to park in a residential street, where you have been politely asked not to park, by the school, without at the very least asking why that is the case. Just ignoring a polite request, is frankly "dickish"

YABU There is a difference between whether something is legal or considerate -and there must be a reason why the school have asked...
My parents bought a house a few doors down from a school - in the early 1960s. The school had been there for a lot longer - it was a 100+ yrs old. They thought it was handy for their DCs ... and it was .
At the time most families only had one car - if they had one at all...the children walked to school... they didn't know that the number of children being dropped off by car would rise so dramatically...and that the roads would get so much busier.
They no longer live there but kept in touch with the neighbours -apparently it became hell - the road became really busy (especially in the mornings). They had drives but with lots of cars dropping off at school and (legally) parked on the road - even if their drives weren't blocked - due to the layout of the road they couldn't see the clearly to get out safely. Worse they had a hard space in front of their walls - a spare parking place, long and narrow you had to park sideways but was handy for visitors -some parents dropping off took to parking there. There were a couple of big arguments between parents who had blocked each other in by parking on the road and there. And the residents complained - as you would if someone was effectively parking on your drive. Whether it belonged to the houses or the council was disputed - the houses had maintained it for years. The council claimed it and grassed it ...and then said it was a mistake...and they wouldn't maintain it. So the residents had lost their spare parking place, had to start mowing it and some people doing the school drop off still parked on it and churned it up...
There was a small estate built at the back of the houses - only access via a side road - the furthest away house from the school on that estate must have been a 5 min walk at most. There were a couple of parents who would drive out of there daily and park outside the school to drop off - I understand it was on their way to work or whatever...but seeing as it was so congested...
The school closed a few years ago and was empty for a while. It is now a nursery - part of their planning involved making parking spaces within the grounds. So there are ample spaces - but they now have nursery parents parking on the road cos it is easier than pulling into the parking spaces ...but at least they all don't descend at more or less exactly the same time...
They are now talking about single yellow lines - but that means that the residents won't be able to have visitors park outside (and some are elderly and have carers coming) and of course they lost their spare parking places...

Why was my comment about safety so funny Waitrose?

Twopeas that sound like my DS school and the surrounding streets. I am on the parent council and we have tried umpteen things to try and improve the parking, driving and attitudes in general. But many people have the same attitude as OP and don't seem to care that children's lives are at risk or that local residents are having to put up with this daily nonsense. The parent council have advised the residents to call the police, and we have started photographing bad behaviour and sending them to our local council, cc'ing in the community police officer. If people insist on acting like tossers then that's all you can do two

Ask Basil sorry to dissapoint but i dont drive i walk if you know what that word means

FFS grow up, cut the whinging and walk a few minutes more to school by parking elsewhere. Or use a school bus if there is one (provided it can get down the road if it's not blocked by inconsiderate arses who believe they're entitled to park where they want.

It's really not going to damage you or your precious moppets one iota.

I know that AIBU posts aren't fond of facts, but I will try anyway....this is about London schools but I am sure the situation is the same in many large towns and cities:
"Pollution around some of London's schools is twice the legal level resulting in children being kept indoors at playtime. London Play's director Paul Hocker and Sam Williams at ARUP came up with a solution in this U.N. paper last September. In a nutshell, create traffic exclusion zones around schools. Read the full paper here."
www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/CRC/Discussions/2016/PaulHocker.pdf

Parents in cars are in competition to be the biggest twat at 9am and 3.15 pm.

Don't join in with them..... park round the corner and walk in, just keep a tight hold of your kids and elderly relatives because they don't like to stop for anything.

When my eldest started grammar school part of the home school agreement was that you didn't park within a certain distance of school. Can't remember exactly what it was but think it might have been 200m.

We all complied, not that I dropped him off very often but it did happen occasionally, I wonder what the school could do if parents ignored a home school agreement?

BigGranny we had a near miss a couple weeks ago with a child almost hit. Our lollipop lady gave up after the summer so where she used to patrol was a four way section and a major crossing point for kids. The council are not replacing her as they are making major cuts and not once since August has a car ever stopped to let us cross the road. It is very busy and sometimes cars park right across there despite there being lines everywhere. They are just so inconsiderate and it's bloody dangerous. The police have patrolled a couple mornings after receiving complaints but as soon as they were away it just went back to the way it was. So the letter came out Monday about the parking so I thought OP was maybe one of our school parents.

Twopeas that is awful!! You should write to your MP/MSP about road safety and what action they intend to take since they have neglected to replace the lollipop lady. Our lollipop lady is at controlled crossing, but it's an extremely busy road and drivers don't often stop for the red light never mind the woman in the fluorescent jacket! I have written to my MSP and we are arranging meetings with local councillors etc we've had a lot of near misses recently, my kids and me and other parents too. And it's the same people all the time

It is also worth noting, that idling vehicles and the pollution they cause has direct links to asthma and alzheimers.

Sure, you need to get your kids to school, but parking a few streets away causes less pollution in area less dense with vulnerable little kids

www.alzheimers.net/11-07-16-alzheimers-linked-to-air-pollution/
asthma and air pollution in the los angeles area

www.asthma.org.uk/advice/triggers/pollution/

Honestly gobsmacked at some of these tales of selfish parking. People are so selfish, it's awful near our local schools too. We love a 10 minutes walk away from school and pass parents getting into their cars to drive to school and they go home afterwards, not on to work. Just lazy and selfish. We had a similar incident recently, and neighbour had a party on a weekend afternoon, some of the guests parking was atrocious, one woman parked partly in a bus lay by and partly over another neighbours drive and refused to move her car when asked to. Someone else parked over our dropped curb and driveway and refused to move as our car wasn't on the drive at the time. Absolute cunts.

Really the bottom line should be if you are capable of walking and it's not a long way, then walk. Particularly if there's parking a few minutes walk away. Build extra time into your day if you need to. When I lived closer to DS' school, even with my mobility issues, I would walk him to school then walk home and get in my car to go to work. It's only now I live further away that I have to drive and as i posted earlier I stick to the rules that the council and police have approved for blue badge holders. If I didn't i would get approved ticket too, and deservedly so. On days I don't work I will walk DS to and from school, mainly because I can't face the carnage. I can only do this on days I don't work as I need to lay down and rest for up to an hour afterwards as my legs become useless.

Really, people who are hale and hearty don't know how lucky they are. If I had the ability to walk that they do I'd do it every day. Instead not only can they walk but they drive and park like dicks too.

we have this issue at my DD's school. At the back gate there are houses which have been there long before the back gate was opened. When it was opened it was as a safe walking route but now loads of parents compete to see who can park nearest the gate making it awkward to use the gate, awkward to ensure children and parents can cross safely, they block driveways and park dangerously on the junction of an already small and crowded road. There is a pub car park 5 minutes up the road that have agreed parents can use for drop off/pick up but most people ignore this and insist on parking right at the gate

Jopickles we have a similar set up. There are lots of signs telling parents not to park right near the back gate entrance but they all compete to see how close they can get. It makes it hard to get a clear view when we're trying to cross the road. I've contacted the school, the police and the council and apparently no one cares enough about children's safety to enforce parking rules.

Do you what? The HT has got better things to do than answer letters, email, phone calls from residents because you are too lazy to walk a bit. So yes YABU and wasting someone's valuable time

It's probably the inconsiderate few who have parked over dropped kerbs etc.At my DS school one mother kept parking on the zig zags and when the Head had a word with her, pointing out that she was making crossing unsafe for other people's children, she got really annoyed, tried to turn it into an argument, and then said 'I had all this trouble at his last school' and flounced off. I don't know what you do with people like that - short of running them over - and it's probably the minority like her who are winding up the local residents. At his junior school the 'naughty' parkers would scatter when a dad, who was in a police patrol car, appeared but as soon as he drove off back they came. Some people just don't care about anyone else, sadly.

As someone who lives in a street near two schools I can tell you that though here's no parking restrictions the behaviour of some parents is shocking. Having cars parked nose to tail all the way down the street, coupled with those parking across driveways and those stopping in the road to pick up their kids has almost caused several serious accidents as drivers can't see the kids or manoeuvre safely. I don't want to maim anyone's children or be involved in an accident myself but there is zero visibility thanks to parents who can't be arsed to walk for an extra thirty seconds or park even one street away.