School Travel Plan Initiatives 

• School Travel Plans
• Public-transport
• Cycling
• Walking
• Inside the school
• Overcrowded car parks
• Outside the school
• Other options

School Travel Plans

• Make STP available to whole school community including staff, parents, pupils, and local residents.

• Promote 'green' transport in prospectus and in school newsletters.

• Raise awareness of the importance of a healthy lifestyle.

• Educate pupils on consequences of travel decisions within curriculum (incorporate walking/cycling, pollution monitoring school journey survey, i.e. Lessons such as health and fitness, science, English, art, maths, geography.)

• Include school travel information in pupils' personal organisers.

• Educate parents with the aid of leaflets (to alleviate parental fears for safety of children from traffic and from other people).

• School gate package information campaign (not everyone comes into the school to see a notice board, therefore, handing out information in a form of leaflets at the school gate can be a good idea).

• Develop and regularly update a display board for STP communication purposes.

• Involve or nominate pupils, school travel co-ordinator and governor to continue monitoring and delivering initiatives.

• Competitions (art, poetry, prose, etc)

• Campaign aimed at education and information for both the school and its feeder schools (posters, leaflets, more surveys, joining in national events like car-free day)

• Make results of STP initiatives monitoring available on the Internet, local press etc.

• If, as part of the STP process, a planning for real event is considered appropriate, it could be held at a local supermarket for maximum publicity.

• Invite parents to sign a Parents' Pledge aimed at promoting responsible use of the motor car.

• Development of home-school agreements (an agreement between the school and parents with regard to sustainable travel arrangements and how both parties can support them).

• Reduced car use/ walk to school/ exercise challenge diaries.

• First day absence reporting (telephoning the parents of pupils who are not at registration - this is also useful as an anti-truancy measure)

• Change school policies e.g. permit cycling to school.

• Make contact, or twin, with another school may be locally or even in another country to exchange experiences and views.

• Promotional materials designed by pupils e.g. badges, stickers, logos, and leaflets (pupils designs can also be incorporated into cycle racks, gates and fencing).

• Involvement in Walk to School campaigns.

• Walking or cycling the route to school with parents as part of induction for new pupils.

• Pursue 'Eco' School status (the whole school works towards obtaining Ecological School status this includes not just sustainable travel but recycling, and any measures that make the school ecologically friendly. This can provide a goal that the whole school and parents can strive for and which shifts the emphasis away from being asked to reduce car travel to wanting to reduce car travel to help the school achieve its goal).

• Offer privileges to those who walk and cycle i.e. priority in lunch queue, free lockers etc.

• Establish a school cycling policy, a safe cycling code and cycle permit scheme.

• Consider changes to school uniform, perhaps pupils can design something with safety in mind.

• Supply cycle helmets, reflective clothing, badges and other accessories to pupils at discounted prices.

• Make changes to the homework timetable so that pupils do not have too much to carry on any one day, this could apply to teachers too.

Improve information/services for alternative travel modes

Public-transport

• Provide information about public transport services.

• Educate pupils in how to use timetables.

• Liase with public-transport operators to amend service routes, times and revise bus fares (e.g. low-fare deals for pupils, return fares to encourage pupils to take the bus both ways).

• Liase with public-transport operators and/or Council to improve transport facilities e.g. bus shelters at popular sites.

• Provide information to help parents organise regular minibus services.

• Discussions with Council on locations for park and ride bus stopping points.

• Establish a school behaviour code for bus users.

• Escorted school bus schemes e.g. Surrey County Council have a scheme in which parents on an organised rota act as escorts for younger pupils, carrying mobile phones for emergencies, this has allowed even pupils with special needs to travel to school by bus.

Cycling

• Survey's to identify potential demand for cycling (staff and pupils). Encouraging cycling by providing additional secured and sheltered bicycle parking and lockers.

• Encouragement for girls to cycle (girls are often less likely to cycle than boys)

• Run regular cycling proficiency courses.

• Buddying schemes, when novice and experienced cyclists pair up to ride together on the school route. These are a good follow on from more formal cycle training.

• Provision of cycle helmets to support cycle training.

• Promote cycling by holding a riding skills competition in the schools grounds.

• Cycle maintenance courses.

• Fund-raising events (possibly a sponsored cycle) to construct cycle storage / changing facilities / the showers / lockers etc.

Walking

• Work with Council to identify potential improvements to local footpaths and cycle paths. (See attached list of possible infrastructure improvements and Traffic Regulation Orders).

• Issue pupils and parents with safe routes maps and guides.

• Pedestrian training e.g. Oxford's 'footsteps' child pedestrian training scheme.

• Personal safety training

• Puddle/pot hole watch schemes.

• Set up voluntary school crossing patrols.

• Encourage walking by providing secure storage for books and equipment (use a sponsored walk as a fundraiser).

• Promote voluntary pupil/parent measures i.e. Walk more often, change routine to allow walking regularly/occasionally, start a walking bus /walking to school rota, buddy schemes etc. Intrinsica software can put people in touch with others interested for the walking bus scheme.

Inside the school

• Work with the Council on measures to improve in its internal layout issues in order to improve safety on the access into school.

• Creation of an additional school access.

• Providing separate entrances for walkers and cyclists.

• Traffic free school entrances.

• Paint an advisory zebra crossing on the ground within the gates near the school entrance.

• Closing the site to cars at the end of each school day in order to give pedestrians and cyclists priority.

• Priority measures for school buses.

Overcrowded car parks

• Parking restrictions on the school site.

• Restricting car access to the site.

• Encouraging those parents who drive to park further away and complete the journey on foot.

• Park and walk scheme with a near by supermarket

• Allocate spaces for teachers on a rotational basis that live more than five miles away.

• Limit number of visitors spaces (with explanation on notice board)

• Encourage car sharing (possible use of a car sharing database for use in schools developed by DfEE).

• Improve on-site security.

• CCTV near cycle sheds etc.

• Campaign to raise issues of vandalism and theft (involve pupils in decisions and improvements to give them a sense of ownership therefore reducing damage and theft).

Outside the school

• Higher Police profile for enforcement of zig-zag markings

Other options

• Amending school start and finish times.
• Before and after school clubs to reduce parking congestion.