Travel over 1 hour both ways

[EngineerMumOf2]

My DD is starting her secondary from Sept this year. Her school is 37 miles away from home (grammar school). There is a school bus which takes 1 hour 25 minutes both ways. Am I doing a wrong thing by making my DD travel so long everyday? Please suggest.

[Bossinger]

I wouldnt do it.

What time would she have to leave and what time would she be home?

Winters are mostly horribly rainy, windy and cold.

I know she can wrap up warm but being in the dark when you are hungry and tired is grim.

[EngineerMumOf2]

@ineedaholidaynow yes. She knows at least 6 of the 10 students who are starting secondary this year. One of them is her classmate. Others are in the drawing/music class that she goes to. We are friends with their parents too.

[Moonpie07]

OP, just to add. The travel was one of my biggest concerns before DS started. 6 months in now and its just habit. My thought was though that if he hated it and couldn't cope, we could always move to local school but you can't turn down grammar place and then change mind. I felt better once I realised that lots of others do same/similar journeys and cope.
BTW, DS is currently out playing with friends from his primary (all at different schools) as he does every weekend. They all stay in touch.

[EngineerMumOf2]

@Bossinger The bus starts at 7:10. In the evening it is scheduled to reach here at 16:54.

[HappyDinosaur]

I used to travel an hour by bus to and from school and quite liked it really. We had a sort of bus community thing and sometimes we did work on the way to or from school, spelling testing each other out loud etc. If she's ok with it I think it's fine.

[YesQueen]

I did 29 miles each way year 5 and I remember crying with tiredness. School started at 9 but after prep etc we didn't leave until 5, I was getting home after 6 because of traffic and up at 6am

[Sandysaurus]

Did I read above that you are planning to work from home? One option may be for you to rent an office space or join a co-working space near the school. Then you could drive your DD 35 mins in, work nearby all day, and then pick her up and drive home together. Would that work with your other child's drop off / pick up? If this plan is feasible it would give you a bit of adult company through the day too.

[TeenTimesTwo]

So you could in theory drive her there and back in less time than it will take her to go by bus.

Is there any mileage (excuse the pun) in car sharing with 2 or 3 other parents and sharing the pain? May be totally impractical with work and siblings though.

Or a privately hired minibus just for the 10 who live close and it can go direct not round the houses? Again probably not possible / too expensive.

[MeMeMeYou]

We were taken on our tour of the school my daughter goes to by a girl whose commute was quite long but door to door on a bus. She said she did quite a bit of homework on the bus and made the best use of time and it was a bit of an annoyance but tolerable.

My daughter will only be travelling 4km but as it's across different boroughs it's two buses and about 45 mins each way. We are moving closer soon and I will be able to drop off and pick up (20 mins drive) at least twice a week. On the other days I am going part of the way towards younger child's school so can drop her closer for the final leg.

WIth working from home, do you have flexibility to drop her at a convenient point along the way?

[hopefulhalf]

Ds (y10) and Dd (y7) both do this type of journey (SS grammar by train not bus). Yes they are tired in the winter months, but both manage to fit in sport, homework and socialising just fine. They are 2 of a group of about 50 doing this journey from here, good points are; it builds resileince, they are used to taking trains by themselves and they have wider friendship groups as they have "home friends", " train friends" and school friends. As others has said there is also an informal homework club on the train. I feel they have a richer experience than they would attending a walking distance school. As for the poster who would only commute 25 minutes for work

[EngineerMumOf2]

@Sandysaurus Me dropping her to school and picking her up may not be an option. We contacted private taxi/minibus services to drop and pickup 10 children both ways. But it was estimated to cost £3500 a year. Some of us found it difficult to afford.

[birdonawire1]

Our school is 30 miles away. We have a rota for taking him, me, dh and my DM. We're ok with it now but took a while to get used to. No sure if I'd liked to have done all the driving. As there are other local children going how about a driving rota with other parents?

[Sandysaurus]

OP I'm not sure if you got my post confused with someone else's? I suggested finding a co-working space near the school, nothing about paying for taxis or minibusses. Either way, I wish you luck with it all, it sounds as though you are having to balance lots of different people's needs, which is never easy.

[Toomanystorieslost]

Are you sure it will only take an hour and 25 minutes to do 37 miles?
My girls school is six miles away and it can regularly take longer than that if they hit the traffic. She leaves at 7 and gets there anywhere between 8 and 8.40am. It's a nightmare and I wouldn't choose it again.

Our local city is 13 miles away and easily takes more than an hour in peak hours.

[EngineerMumOf2]

@birdonawire1 driving rota will not work as only 3 or 4 parents from the group are willing to do. Understandably, some parents have only one car or young children. I may also find it difficult to drop and pick up even if it is one day a week as it is not a short distance.

[hopefulhalf]

OP as I said my dc do this and are fine. However before we committed to sending them to these schools we discussed the fact that there would be times when we had to drive out of our way, sometimes late at night or early on sunday morning to facillitate their involvement in the school. If you feel you can't do this because "it's not a short distance "I would really think about whether this is the right choice for your family.

[EngineerMumOf2]

Thank you so much for your responses. I will let my DD take the bus in September as I have already paid for the first month journey.
If it is too tiring, I'll arrange for her train and taxi. I am already in the WhatsApp group of parents who are currently doing train-taxi.
If that also didn't work, I'll seriously start looking for a house to buy or rent. I'll also start applying for a job there (as working from home may not work for too long).

[Mistigri]

You may not get the full picture in September - it'll be worse when she is leaving and getting home in the dark.

My DD did this for 2 years - 50km journey twice a day, taking at least 1 hour but sometimes more than 2 hours if traffic was bad. We moved in the end as it was unsustainable and having an impact on her mental health.

DS attends the same school which is now a 15 min walk away and it's a very different experience for him.

[ineedaholidaynow]

If the OP already knows parents of children who are already doing this journey, then she can check with them if journey times differ.

It’s interesting people going on about traffic being bad, our school run is very rural so traffic not a problem apart from tractors, main obstacle is usually cows in the road!

[WickedGoodDoge]

DC have a not too dissimilar trip to/from school. We leave the house at 7:00 for their school bus which is at 7:10. Depending on traffic, they get to school between 8:30-8:45. Coming home is faster- the bus leaves the school at 3:45 and they are home by 5:00.

If they have activities after school, I either pick them up (usually takes me 40 minutes to get there and an hour home if in rush hour) or they get the train (10 minute walk to bus, 20 minutes on bus, 10 minute walk to train, 25 minutes by train and either I pick them up or they walk 15 minutes from the station).

They’ve been doing this since they were 11 and it’s fine. They adapted to the routine pretty quickly.

[RuthW]

Gosh no way. More than an hour is a holiday!

[Superfragile]

Not read all replies but look on the 11+ forum, there are lots of kids doing longer commutes. We are rural and the nearest senior school is just over 1h on the school bus. My kids enjoy the bus ride more than school

[Phineyj]

These kinds of journeys are not unusual in Kent, where I went to school. I don't think they're ideal and I do remember being tired, especially when working for A level. I think you need to be prepared to drive her once or twice a week especially if she has to lug e.g. sports kit, instruments or art portfolio. My DM would do this once a week and we really appreciated it

I thought the suggestion to rent a co-working space near the school was genius! Although your DS would have to go to wrap around care I suppose, but that would kind of share the pain a bit (and my Y1 daughter loves wrap around - it takes the place of the playing out I did at her age).

[Teddyreddy]

I had a commute of over an hour on the train all the way through secondary school. It never bothered me as long as I got a seat as it wasn't dead time, I'd talk to friends, do homework or read. I lived the freedom of knowing how to take the train, it meant I could see friends or go shopping by myself.

I wouldn't panic yet, with a good size group of other students doing the same commute the chances are she'll be fine - it's very different in how it feels to doing a work commute all by yourself.

[MrPickles73]

Dd age 8 does a 1 hour commute each way to school via school minibus. She started a year ago. It wouldn't be my first choice
Village primary is a picturesque 15 min walk but we had a dire time and after trying various things just couldn't see eye to eye with the school. Half of the children in her class live near the school and half are quite remote. We tend to have sleepovers rather than playdates. They do a lot of clubs st lunchtime which she enjoys. None of her friends live near us but she accepts that. We have discussed moving nearer the school but DD and the rest of us like where we live. She is shattered by the end of term. Once a week I drive her to / pick her up from school so she can stay for a club.