Home News and Publications Links Contact Us School Travel Plans and Safer Routes to Schools

School Travel Plans logoTip of the Month - Archive

Every month, the School Travel Planning Team provide you with a new tip or idea, which may help you with developing your travel plan. We have collected these either from going out to schools ourselves, from other local authorities or from organisations such as Sustrans. If you have any suggestions that you would like to make, please contact the team so that we can share your great ideas!

No. Month/Year Tip.
1 October 2005 Try using the School Council or a group of willing pupils to write a set of guidelines to send home to parents about how they would like them to behave e.g. 'please don't park near the entrance as we cannot see if it is safe to cross'.
2 November 2005 Organise a poster competition at your school to promote walking and cycling in all weather.
3 December 2005 Create a distance map or chart that shows how far children have walked/cycled in a week, month, year etc in relation to geographical places, e.g. to Disney World, the height of Ben Nevis etc. Great to link with map reading skills!
4 January 2006 Walking Routes. Take groups of children and comment on routes, taking photos of problems/issues which can prompt children of any issues or feelings. This can then provide great evidence in your travel plan.
5 February 2006 Rather than giving pupils fluorescent clothing that is out of date and unlikely to wear, why not use lesson time to get them to design their own fluorescent clothing or accessories and see if any local businesses will provide funding to have them made!
6 March 2006 For those parents who are only able to drive their children to school, but would like to make a positive contribution, why not start up a 'carbon off-setting' scheme. This would simply involve setting a small amount of money per mile that parents pay, and this is then put towards green travel e.g. fluorescent jackets or umbrellas for those who walk to school.
7 April 2006 As part of Bike to School week (or any other cycling initiative, why not start up an after-school bike club? It's fun for the children and they will also learn some key skills about bike maintenance and safety.
Ideas to get started include beginning with a small group of interested older pupils who will act as role models, run specific projects that last for about an hour e.g. mending a tyre, and keep it fun with competitions and quizzes!
8 May 2006 Why not link up with your feeder school to look into any issues that new pupils may have when they progress from junior to senior school. Changing schools is often a very intimidating experience, so perhaps you could consider providing a map to show the safer routes and/or initiating a 'buddy' scheme whereby older pupils walk/cycle with new pupils until they feel confident travelling by themselves.
9 June 2006 If your school has speed issues, why not involve the children by using a speed gun to measure traffic speed. This data can then be analysed within the classroom and used as a baseline survey for your travel plan. The data could be given to the local Police to help with enforcement.
10 July 2006 Interested in setting up a car sharing club but not sure if there are enough people who live close enough to one another? The School Travel Planning Team can obtain the postcodes for all of the pupils at your school and plot them on maps which will enable you to clearly see if there is potential for sharing. If you would like further information on car sharing visit either http://www.school-run.co.uk/ or http://www.liftshare.org/
11 August 2006 If you have problems with unsafe and illegal parking problems outside of your school and have repeatedly included messages within your newsletters, then perhaps you could consider involving the pupils at your school. By asking the children to design pretend parking infringement tickets, then could then hand these out to the drivers of cars who they feel are parked illegally and putting their safety at risk. As it comes directly from the children, more notice is likely to be taken.
12 September 2006 If you are frequently receiving letters from your local residents complaining of parents blocking them in, then perhaps consider providing parents with a local area map of the school indicating where it is and isn't acceptable to park. The School Travel Planning Team can also provide you with maps showing distance rings from the school. These maps can show parents where they can park and still be within a mile or less of the school and perhaps walk with their child/ren, which allows them to plan the right amount of time into their routine to drop off their children.
13 October 2006 Why not set up a Travel Plan Board, preferably in the reception area, so that parents and visitors can be provided with advice and information on how to arrive at the school sustainably. If coming by car is the only option perhaps you could suggest they car share and remind them about the need to drive and park safely. This could be particularly useful at a new parent's evening!
14 November 2006 If you've ever wanted to 'neutralise' the carbon impact of your car on the environment then there are now websites set up so that you and/or your school can do this online. Payments would typically amount to around £20 a year to offset 3.7 tonnes of CO2 equivalent (approximately the emissions of an average car driving 10,000 miles.)
BP have set up their own website: www.targetneutral.com and Climate Care cover flights, heating etc as well as car travel: www.climatecare.org
15 December 2006 Trying to get teenagers to wear fluorescent/reflective clothing? Based on research carried out by 'Safe Kids Walking'. the following ways were more likely to result in younger people wearing items to make them safer;
- wearing other colours than fluorescent yellow e.g. red.
- using integrated hi vis products that has another use
- carrying items is more popular than wearing them e.g. bags
- engage the pupils in the design of the product or the logo, which can then be custom made
- use the older pupils to choose the design of the product as it is more likely to appeal to the whole school and have more 'street cred'
16 January 2007 Invite the children to think of a mascot that could be linked with either walking or cycling e.g. WILF (Walking Is Loadsa Fun). This can be used for all promotional material and events e.g. colouring-in pictures, posters etc.
17 February 2007 If you are about to carry out your parent/pupil survey and are concerned by the amount of responses that you are likely to receive, then perhaps it is worth providing an incentive/reward.
The STP team can provide you with stickers for the pupils and perhaps the school can offer a prize, such as a voucher or have a raffle for the responses from parents.

The team can also provide an online survey form for pupils and staff which can collate the results in an Excel spreadsheet. Ask the team for further details.
18 March 2007 If you are continuously receiving complaints from residents and/or parents about the unsafe parking/driving of some inconsiderate drivers, then perhaps the school could provide a log book to the school community. This will enable people to take a note of the number plate of the offender and write it anonymously in a book. This will enable the school and/or the Police to tackle the individuals, whilst avoiding confrontation with residents and other parents.
19 April 2007 Not sure which fluorescent clothing or accessories are most effective? Consider working with a group or class of children to investigate and test various items and produce a leaflet or presentation to feed back to the rest of the school and/or parents.
20 May 2007 Would you like to engage your pupils in designing their own reflective accessories? The School Travel Planning team are currently trying to purchase off-cuts from various companies which we can provide schools with to use in lessons. If you would be interested in using these, please contact the team.
21 June 2007 If engaging secondary school pupils is a problem, perhaps integrate travel issues within a media project whereby students film their issues relating to their journey to and from school. This can then be shown to the rest of the school and start to raise a debate. (Example provided by Brookfield Community School)
22 July 2007 If you're finding problems attracting volunteers to provide cycle/pedestrian training or assisting with your walking bus, perhaps you could start up an exclusive membership club at the school. This could be made available to parents who are giving up their time to help the school and they (and their children?) could be rewarded with preferential treatment e.g. free entry to events, facilities etc. The school could also arrange an end of year/term social event or awards event in a school assembly!
23 August 2007 The School Travel Planning Team have now designed and produced their own classroom wall charts to enable schools to set up their own incentive scheme. Younger children enjoy the competition of a reward chart and enjoy receiving stickers etc to show positive behaviour. If you would be interested in receiving some classroom charts and/or other promotional materials, please contact the team.
24 September 2007 One way of integrating the travel plan within the curriculum is to ask pupils to write a week diary of their journey to school. This could be an ideal piece of homework and would be interesting to look at within an English class. It will also provide evidence in your travel plan of any issues or concerns that children have on their journey to and from school.
25 October 2007 To encourage parents to feel safe about their children walking to school, you could perhaps start up a Neighbourhood School Watch scheme which is created along the routes along that children take to school. Residents can display a badge in their window showing that they are a caring neighbour and will watch to check if any instances occur and report them if necessary.
This would be an informal arrangement and it would need to be made clear to parents that they are still responsible for their child's safety on the journey to school, not the school.
26 November 2007 If you're looking of ways of encouraging staff to travel more sustainably but most of them live quite a distance, why not encourage staff travelling from out of town to meet in a central place and walk the last part of the journey to school? The team could loan the staff pedometers so they can see how many extra steps they're taking, how many calories they're burning etc.
27 December 2007 So as to give those children who walk or cycle a priority over car users, and to encourage a safer environment outside of the school gates, why not allow those travelling to and from school by sustainable means to leave 5 minutes early?
28 January 2008 To promote the use of road safety clothing and accessories, why not have a 'Road Safety Gear' fashion show and encourage pupils to design some of the items themselves.  This could link in with the curriculum and promote a positive image of reflective/fluorescent clothing!
29 February 2008 So as to entice staff to travel to school sustainably, consider launching a 'commuter challenge' whereby staff sign up to either walk, cycle, car share or travel via public transport for 2 journeys a month, for 3 months. Names can then go in a hat for various prizes which local businesses may be able to support.
30 March 2008 To encourage enterprise within schools and to try and overcome the barriers to walking and cycling, why not try a 'Dragon's Den' challenge. By encouraging the children to come up with inventions or ideas, it may provide some interesting solutions which will appeal to a variety of circumstances.
31 April 2008 Schools now need show through their Travel Plans how they will be promoting the aims and objectives of the travel plan. One way of demonstrating this is to include some information within your school's prospectus or including some information on your website. To help schools with this, Stockport Metropolitan Borough Council have produced a template leaflet to include within schools' prospectus', and they have kindly allowed us to give it to our schools.
32 May 2008 When developing your travel plan and consulting with key partners, it may be useful to contact both your County Councillor/s and your District Councillor/s. They will be able to advise you what is happening in the local area, and provide support and advice on the suggestions that you make in your action plan.

Details on your County Councillor or District Councillor, are available on Hampshire County Council's website.
33 June 2008 If one of the issues flagged up in the surveys is about fading lines, encroaching hedges, overgrown trees etc, then why not  fill out HCC's online defect form?
34 July 2008 If you are looking to open up an old entrance or need to clear vegetation in order to create a new path/access, why not advertise for volunteers and arrange a day on the weekend where you can clear most of the undergrowth and therefore reduce some of the costs. You may also have a local business or a training establishment e.g. for the navy, who maybe able to help with resources and/or manpower.

Any volunteers could then be rewarded with a barbeque and a pat on the back!
35 August 2008 Now that Governors are expected to produce 'School Profile' reports for parents, why not use this as an opportunity to inform parents that you are promoting sustainable travel and/or safety through your travel plan. It's an excellent way of demonstrating to parents that the safety and wellbeing of your pupils is important! To read your school's 'School Profile' visit http://schoolsfinder.direct.gov.uk/about-school-profile
36 September 2008 Did you know that for all schools submitting pupils' mode of travel through their school census, we can now plot how pupils are travelling and from where?

It is only compulsory for schools with travel plans in place to submit this, but it is equally useful for schools who haven't as it can help you identify any potential issues.

If you would like free map/s showing this information, please contact the team who will be able to help you with providing this.