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??

Spot on, @twofalls. How dare the school want to make the road by the school safer for the children attending that school. And how dare they suggest that parents could have a bit of consideration, and park further away, so that all the children are safer and aren't having to negotiate a road full of drivers - all of whom are considerate (of course), and have a LEGAL RIGHT to drive down there.

Even if EVERYONE parks legally and considerately, the road is still going to be a nightmare of people manoeuvering in and out of parking spaces, jostling to pass each other etc etc - can people honestly not understand how that makes the road so unsafe for the children going to and from school???

Good post twofalls.

The yellow lines in my road are definitely enforceable as the council have told me they are.

Their excuse for not enforcing them is that they can't send someone out every day!

Considering I am 99% sure they have NEVER sent anyone out that is a pathetic excuse plus why pay to have them put in in the first place? I don't want my council tax wasted like that thank you.

Why are you asking if you don't want to hear anything different from what you already plan to do? Waste of time.
CockacidalManiac

Like PPs have said, if everyone had the attitude of "legally I can park there so I will" then of course the road will get dangerously congested. I can't understand what's a couple of minutes walking to a car further back, I.e. Not parked exactly outside the school gates. Your kids aren't the only kids leaving the school, how about parents stop being entitled dicks and be a bit more considerate for children's safety?!

The juniors at ds school finish 15 mins after the infants yet today when I went to pick up ds (infants arrived with 5 mins to spare) one of the junior mums was sat in her car outside school. Even dafter - she lives on the same estate as the school and under a 3 minute walk away! I just don't get why you would waste half an hour just to save a 5 minute walk!

I've only read the first and last page, great post twofalls!

I don't live anywhere my school so I have to drive. However I like the kids to develop road safety especially around busy sites like schools.

I park away from the school purely so they can walk a little way to practice crossing roads, looking for danger etc.

However I Presently, I park on the estate on a friend's drive as I'm pregnant and struggling with walking due to spd. I take our lives in our hands everyday. Mainly down to the shocking parking obstructing roads then subsequent angry driving, navigating around those cars, by other road users (mainly parents too, rushing kids in or out!) definitely see awful double parking, parking on yellow lines, zig zags.... It's those people that end up causing residents or indeed other road users to complain and our school has a duty to request we park considerately. Quite right. I've even spoken to a good friend's husband to ask why they think it's OK to do 50 in a 20 outside their own school... No one cares about his shiny BMW exhaust.. I digress but parking and speeding are such a pain at our school. I'd like cameras or humps on our school road.

I have seen someone repeatedly park illegally and get tickets and blame the traffic warden 😱 yet when their precious bundle is injured on that road, they'll be up in arms.

Park where its legal but be considerate. You can legally park in a spot which stops a fire engine having access for example.

I think (where practical) parents should park a little further away.

Your kids aren't the only kids leaving the school

That's news to some parents.

I'd love it if once, just one, someone would have the honesty to admit to being THAT arsehole parent who parks across people's drives

Your kids aren't the only kids leaving the school on the planet

Fixed that for you.

'Switched on mum' as I said in our street we have residents bays that we pay to be maintained each year and are mentioned in our title deeds.
Inconsiderate parents park in these preventing people who live in our street from using them. Some parents also claim that the parking bays belong to the school. No they don't, they were there before the school.

Parents park in our street that live 1 or 2 streets away. And not just for the few minutes they claim as they block drives, park on pavements and put other children in danger with speeding down the street ignoring speed bumps (which they also park on !)

On a slightly different note - when I posted on this thread the other day, OP had misspelled 'diktat' in the thread title as 'dictat'.

Own up, MNHQ. Which of you is pedantic enough to have been bothered by this and changed it?

Yippie I thought it had changed but then I thought I must've just imagined it!

JacquesHammer love the idea of helicoptering the kids in, there certainly wouldn't be any congestion or danger to kids

This is a systematic problem of course.

The only way it will ever be solved is if the UK ever goes back to the much saner system where instead of being allocated a school via an insane lucky dip/ dibs procedure all children go to their local school, to which the vast majority can walk and the rest are bused.

Our road has zig zags on one side. So they park on the other which means totally blocking the view of a T junction which is at a funny angle anyway. I get really stressed when I can't see anything - children/oncoming traffic etc etc
The stupidest thing is, there's a car park which is empty for all of this. I walked from the school gate to the carpark and its 43 steps away and people still won't use it. It's also closer to the main road so you can skip all the traffic jam/queue/turning around and just drive out

The only way it will ever be solved is if the UK ever goes back to the much saner system where instead of being allocated a school via an insane lucky dip/ dibs procedure all children go to their local school, to which the vast majority can walk and the rest are bused.

If ever there was such a golden age it was when fewer parents, and especially fewer mothers, had access to a car. I fear that many of those who could walk would still be driven and you certainly could not make those further off use the bus even if was free.

Andrew I'm writing from the point of view of someone bringing my own children up in a country where that is the norm now. My kids take the bus, those within a km (years 1-4) or 1.5 km (year 5 and older) walk in groups. Parents supervise the busier road crossing as lollypop lady/man on a rota basis if they possibly can - despite working most of us manage it once per fortnight.

Recently it has been very, very cold (coldest winter since2008, daytime temps haven't hit freezing this month) and for the first time in my time doing morning lollypop duty about 10% of parents drove last week (it was -13 degrees) and it feels insanely dangerous for the kids walking into the school and multiple times more stressful doing crossing duty with so many parents trying to drop their especially cold sensitive children/ inadequately dressed children off. Normally only 2 or three children are dropped off bycar for an entire primary, which makes walking to school vastly safer.

Sorry Frances I didn't realise that Scotland didn't have the loopy lucky dip choices system.

But how depressing that even where all children go to the local school so many drive! It's insane as where nobody (or virtually nobody) drives their children to school it is safe to walk, but once more than a few percent decide to drop their kids by car it becomes far more dangerous for the children walking and getting off the buses and so a vicious circle kicks in, all because of an entitled/ thoughtless/ selfish few

Street behind me also leads to our local school.

One of the mothers in that street has on a few occasions driven from her house to the school, about 10 houses worth. Blocked the turning point there with her car.
Put children in the car and then drove back to her house. That to me is the height of laziness.

And before anyone mentions it, there is no SN or other disabilities. I know the mum and children. Just pure laziness.

Surely in England the most likely school to get a place is your closest school? And the majority of kids go to the nearest school? Unless they travel for a faith school or a faith school is closer but community school still nearby?

People hardly get to choose from any community school they like within a 10, or even 2 mile radius.

Then why do so many people claim that they "have," to drive their children to school Sixth?

We could walk 20mins along a narrow county road with no pavement and plenty of blind spots, and where people often do 60mph, but we would probably die.

We have to drive. There isn't any other way around it. It's not that hard to comprehend.