Local parents want safe active travel routes to schools, including on Mill Road

400 local parents respond to school journeys survey

Enabling safe active travel is particularly important for young people. Childhood obesity is becoming endemic, with associated negative health impacts that affect children for the rest of their lives. Enabling walking and cycling has a positive impact on youngsters’ physical and mental health, and forms good habits which persist into adulthood.

Sustrans reports that

• most children want to walk or cycle to school
• most children live near enough to walk or cycle to school
• the proportion of children walking and cycling to school has been declining since 1995
• as many as one in four cars on the road during the morning peak are on the school run

We asked parents how much they valued a low-traffic Mill Road – and 3 out of 4 rated it as “important” or “very important”. A significant majority also supported the return of the bus gate on Mill Road bridge.

Coleridge Community College	22
Morley Memorial Primary	4
Parkside Community College	60
Ridgefield Primary	7
St Bedes Inter-Church School	83
St Matthews Primary	205
St Paul’s C of E Primary	9
St Philips C of E Primary	26
Other	54
Total	470