Drive to school or public transport?

[IamnotStiller]

Just out of interest how far do you drive to take your DC's to secondary school and pick them up again? Choosing secondary schools at the moment we have a potential distance of approx. 15 miles which DS could do by train (would still have to take him to the station) but could also drive and could combine with first DS, cost wise would probably be cheaper to drive but not sure if I'd be willing to do it every day (and pick up again).

DD1 was nervous about taking the bus to school when she started her secondary school a few weeks ago. The bus journey is now her favourite part of the day!

Are you saying you've got another child to drop off somewhere en route?

With term time rail pass, It costs DS £2/day roundtrip to go to school almost 10 miles away.
It would cost me £16/day to drive there & back. So bit of a no-brainer even if I didn't value my own time and have to be at other schools at the same times, too.

If your car is "typical" then it should cost you about £15-£20/day (that includes all costs to move a car from A to B, not just fuel) to drive that 60 miles day, I'm surprised if his train fare is worse than that.
Plus he gets to lark around on the train with mates.

Well, mine walk, but if it were 15 miles, it would definitely be public transport. For their independence skills, for their social life, and for your own sake in terms of the hours you will spend over the next 7 years to-ing and fro-ing to take and fetch.

My DD just started year 7. Her school is 8 miles away and she goes by train. Apparently it's the best part of the day

Our public transport is horrendously expensive, we would be paying close to £200.00 per month in fares so just looking at petrol it would be cheaper to drive, of course taking wear and tear into consideration it would not. I just wondered if there is anyone who does this sort of thing and how they find it. Probably not very pleasant...

Where do you live NotStiller?

Essex

I wouldn't consider a secondary school that isn't completely accessible by public transport, in terms of both journey time, reliability and cost.

Public transport every time. I think part of going to secondary school is learning to be independent. Dd takes the tube to school and is incredibly proud of being able to go under her own steam.

I'd say don't choose a school that your DC can't get to independently, at least most of the time. It's a huge learning experience of real practical life skills.

I briefly taught year 1 students in my workplace. The first time they arrived they were so wiped out by a short local train journey that the didn't learn a thing, and the time they had the " catastrophe" of the " the train stopped but the driver forgot to trigger the door opening mechanism (meaning they went 4 mins down the track and got the train back again) they ate all the biscuits recovering LOL

Cotton wool kids or what!

*my youngest would cope with train /bus simple issues like " not stopping" easily by year 8

Yes, I totally agree that he should be able to get to the school independently. He is happy to do it and quite a few children from our area go there and use the train, so it would not be too traumatic for him as he would have plenty of others to "stick to" to start with. Driving is just another option and was wondering if anyone does such a distance on a daily basis, 15 miles does not sound too bad until you consider it adds up to 60 a day doing it there and back twice! At least it's a back up possibility...

There are girls in my DDs class at school who don't know how to use a train by themselves. I once worked with a woman in her twenties who hadn't been on a bus since the age of about 8 - this was in London. Let that be a warning to you