Why do people drive their kids to school??

[brightonbaker]

Every day My oldest DD 11 walks to school, she is at secondary school and it is about 8minutes walk away. There is one road to cross. I walk my younger DD 8 to school, her school is the same distance. I then get home and go to work, I'm lucky I can start at 9:30.
I think it is good for them to walk to school as it is a good start to the day, exercise, fresh air etc.
I have two neighbours with older DDs about 13 and 14 who I am quite sure have never walked to school, ever. So they leave about the same time as us and get back about the same time as its only 8 minutes walk and by the time they have found somewhere to park** illegally it takes the same amount of time. So why? Why are they doing this? one of the parents does not work so no need to rush and I'm not sure what the other one does.
Really gets on my nerves so thought I'd see if there are some legitimate reasons why people drive to a very local school ?

Waxon I'm in Scotland and going to the catchment school makes no difference to people driving. Our school has a tiny catchment and people drive from the next street to drop the children off then stay chatting in the playground. They really don't care if they block drives either and then the residents of the street can't get out to go to work.

A friend of mine drives her children - ages 13 & 15. The 13yo’s walk would be 15min, the 15yo’s would be 30min. This is because she is worried they may be abducted.

Their primary was a 10min walk and they always drove. That was a double reason of abduction concerns (actually quite valid, we’ve had a raft of attempts) and because she doesn’t like to walk.

I don't want to dismiss fears of abduction.

However, I suspect that more usually when abduction happens it is as a result of custody disputes and the abductor is known to abductee.

It would be relatively easy for strangers to abduct small children at a time and place when no adults are around.

However, I'd question quite how easy to abduct two teenagers walking together in an urban/suburban area or in the streets approaching a school which are usually quite busy.

The old advice about not getting into cars with strangers is relevant. Self-defence classes are also useful.

I suppose the drawback about parental vigilance and protecting teenagers against perceived risks is when does this stop. Are they chauffeured everywhere till they pass their driving test - so they can be protected from the numerous dangers of walking.. (At which point they are presumably given a taxed and insured vehicle.)

How do you measure the perceived risks of abduction against the risks of the pollution experienced when inside vehicles and the risks of being involved as a driver or passenger in road traffic accidents?

Abductions happen, and they are utterly awful, but people die on the roads, too. There were 1,730 road deaths reported in 2015, with twice as many of those being people in vehicles rather than, say, being pedestrians getting knocked down or other types of death.

And that's not counting at all the extra deaths due to poor air quality.

You don't necessarily make your kids safer by shoving them in a car, and you certainly don't teach a 13 year old or a 15 year old how to navigate the world safely (or as safely as possible, which will never be perfectly safe) by locking them away.

Far far more risk due to being in a car than the minuscule risk of abduction! People really suck at judging relative risks it seems.

Archery Anne. Thats all nuts.

Stats show that abductions are no more frequent now as they were 40 years a go. When practically no children travelled to school by car. So why are we making our children less active and less independent. We are mollycoddling them and its nuts. Fresh air and learning how to be safe is better than keeping them children forever.

How did any of us learn to get home at night on our own?

Thing is, the air isn’t fresh at all, is it. In fact congestion is so bad school run times that it’s probably better to drive.

My catchment school is the other side of an airfield so as the crow flies it's close but you have to walk round it which takes me 45 minutes as a steady pace along a 60mph road. I then go to work, finish work with enough time to walk to the car and drive to collect dc. Generally people walk if they're that side of the airfield and drive if they're not. Never understand why people get so hung up on these things.

Laughing - you are exposed to more air pollution inside than outside a car.

Is anyone's school (in England, outside London) signed up to the Modeshift Stars scheme? Only two schools in my town of c.60,000 people are.

www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/jun/12/children-risk-air-pollution-cars-former-uk-chief-scientist-warns

Not if it’s a 5min Drive compared with 25min in repugnant traffic. Shorter time wins.

This thread is fab! Really got me thinking!

Garlicansapphire I completely agree!

LaughingElliot so you are OK with dooming other people's kids to breathe in even more pollution, as long as yours breathe a little less? That sounds horrible, frankly.

Just read about how more than 90% of Japanese children walk to school, or go by public transport by themselves, including the frankly terrifying idea of seven-year-olds taking the train - with changes - by themselves.

I'm not suggesting we shove 7 year olds on the train alone (argh), but it did make me think about how limiting being ferried about everywhere is on teaching children how to navigate the world.