To think 11 is not too young to travel on a train alone?

[Tellmeifimwrong]

Please settle a debate! Happy to hear all opinions.

Is 11 years old, starting y7 in Sept, too young to take a one hour train journey, without parents but with a slightly younger child? Put on at one end by an adult and met at the other end by an adult, with a phone and data, and train staff informed? No behavioural problems or SEN.

There are a lot of bad people out there in plain sight
No, there really are not. It might feel this way when you receive news notification every day but the reality is that the chances of something wrong happening is very very very low.

My kids took the train on their own at a younger age every weekend and nothing untoward never once happened.

What happened though was that it built their sense of responsibility, awareness, confidence so when all the kids applied for jobs at 16, mine were the first to be offered one because they got through the interview with flying colours.

@OliveOilly agreed.

I even googled the tale of the boy getting his decapitated on a train, something like that would surely make the news?
All I could find was a Welsh woman and a man.

Frankly this is a nutty response. 12!
Go out. Get on the tube after school or pretty much any train or bus in any uk city and observe the hoards of children from age 11 travelling alone.
Travel on a bus on a Saturday and look around you. It’s really really normalised.
Even our local authority run clubs allow children from age EIGHT to travel alone if you sign permission. Libraries have signs up saying under 8s must be accompanied, the local swimming pool allows swimmers over 10 to go alone or use the junior gym alone from 11. Tfl issues zip cards for children to travel alone without parents so they can go through the gates without an adult. Local schools are all allowing year 5/6 to travel from school alone, some younger. The railway expressly allows it by us. The dance school he attends has not a single child collected in the 11+ class, cadets has no children collected, bar one that lives a drive away. Year 8s his age even collect younger siblings from activities or school daily. I know only a handful of children with stay at home mums or who live away from transport who are often collected or dropped off. Realistically in London the majority of parents don’t even own cars, and don’t have the time for circular transport runs in rush hour.
Yet you believe that I am the one out of step as to what is normal.

At 11 I def did this and I might be ok with my kids doing this (eldest is 10 atm)

bur responsible for a younger child? No way. 14 minimum for that I’d say.

Let's be clear- the biggest risk to your child is when they are in a car, most likely your car.

Judging by what I see where I live, parents (usually mums on the school run) are driving their 4 x 4s at crazy speeds on narrow roads, a train journey doesn't even register as a risk!

it probably happened before news went online, if it happened

Didn’t quite, this is the one I was referring to

Where I live no, I wouldn’t feel comfortable with this at all

I wouldn't just because so many trains I've been on have had delays mid journey, or been terminated at random places. Not sure how reliable your line is.

@WomblingTree86

Because they’re a bloody 11 year old child. Are substantially MORE VULNERABLE and would have much less capacity to be able to respond to the danger and to emotionally cope following such an awful thing happening to them.

yeah… older people get raped so just allow it to happen to young children… muck in with the rest of us.

Your opinion is completely off the scale looney.

Yes the creep walks past you in the supermarket or on the train

But he abuses the person he has built the relationship with not a random child whose behaviour is unpredictable and could cause a rumpus

I feel sad that you are so scared, it's so illogical , not evidence driven

@OliveOilly So this is the victim’s fault?

That an apparently harmless person sat beside me and groomed me for 2 hours on a train.

Honestly, you need to think about what you’re actually saying.

I think the 11 year old could get the train alone under the circumstances you describe - with phone, being taken to the train and met at the other end (but check whether it's a station where you can go on to the platform with them, because if it isn't it's a bit tricky - eg. finding correct carriage, meeting at an arranged point after the journey)
However, the 11 year old should not be responsible for the 10 year old, and especially not because that is someone else's child and not yours. The other parents have said that is ok, but if something happens they aren't happy with, your child and you will be fully responsible for that. And how well do you know the 10 year old?

My youngest child caught a train from Manchester to Truro when she was 11, so I would not have any qualms about this. I put her on the train (as in got on with her to make sure she had her reserved seat and had organised her luggage), and my parents met her at the other end. I wouldn't have let my DC go together in any combination at those ages, though, as they'd have been a pita for other passengers without a firm maternal hand.

People have skewed ideas of risks.

They really do. And then they pass this huge anxiety to their children, instead of teaching them to be functional/ capable human beings.

The dynamic between the two DCs is key here. At 11, my parents would have been fine with me travelling with my younger best friend. They absolutely wouldn't have let me travel with my cousin of the same age. Different personalities.

I didn't say “older people get raped so just allow it to happen to young children… muck in with the rest of us” so stop trying to put words into my mouth.🙄
I'm not sure a 13 or 14 year old would necessarily have more capacity to deal with the situation and than an 11 year old but presumably you would let them get a train? Capacity to deal with things depends very much on the child and who is around to help. You can't say an 11 year old won't be fine but a 13 year old will.

My god. The only person being unreasonable in this story is you for allowing a 12yr old to travel alone! WTAF?! Why on EARTH is he getting ‘connections’ at his age? Are you trying to get him abducted????? Jesus Christ

Oh good grief, get a grip!
My kids get the train to school, so have done it since they were 11.

The journey is 30 minutes.
If I am working, they sometimes then go and get on a bus for 10 minutes get home from the station.

So yes, they walk the 50 yards from the sation to the bus stop and get a 'connection' Thye also take 2 buses across town to their friends houses, and have on occasion (clutch your pearls) taken the train from school in the OTHER direction to go to a friend's house, which might mean changing trains.

Honestly, the idea that a 12 year old CANNOT do this makes me weep. What are we doing to our kids to make them so babied?

In OPs case, I would say no until they are secondary school age. I think a lot of growing up happens in the second half of year 6 and in the process of going to secondary, so I would use that as my base line and then look at the journey and the child.
eg, if you get an innocent looking train from Chippenham to Bath on a Saturday afternoon, the train can be over run with Bath rugby supporters and the child might find themselves wedged into a seat and unable to move/get off.

I think it can be done but with a lot of preparation. You would have to take them all the way several times, then you can start leaving them halfway and work towards letting them go alone. Let them get very used to the journey and talk them through all eventualities of what can go wrong. That's how I got my not very sensible Yr 6 child going to school on the bus on her own

Absolutely depends on the kids. DS1 (now 12) has been taking DS2 (9) into London by train to be met by his Dad since he was 11, though this is a journey they’re very familiar with and either parent could be there within half an hour by car if the train terminated early and there were no other options (we have had train trouble once and DS1 had to change trains). I’d say this is fine if you trust the kids to be sensible, phones have location on and plenty of battery.

I think there are rules on children travelling alone on trains with regard to their age. I would contact the train operator, I thought an under 12 year old couldn’t travel alone on a train.

There are a lot of posters being gfs for the sake of it. At both ends of the spectrum - from the 'kids can do whatever adults do' to the 'kids can't ever do anything'.

Two children together are much less likely to be approached by anyone than a single child.

I really don't get the logic that the kids shouldn't go together. I'd tell them they have to stick together and look out for each other. Not all the responsibility is on the 11yos shoulders.
BTW if they are the same sex they should go to the toilets together.

I'm always astonished at how many people are so scared of life on MN, it's bizarre. It's not doing your kids any favours at all.

They'll be the parents moving house when their kid goes off to uni.
Or camping nearby at the Reading Festival.

Hovering at the back of the 02 during a concert that their 18 year old is at.

Batshit.

Technically yes, my 10 year old is extremely sensible etc, and could probably do something like this, my 12 year old- definitely not. See it’s not whether they survive the journey, or that they have their ticket etc, it’s more if there’s someone drunk or disorderly that could freak them out/worry them, or the train could stop for longer than usual (you know when you all start getting antsy wondering what’s wrong) and then they have no adult to turn to. So it’s not whether it’s possible, it’s more whether you feel ready to put that level of responsibility on them