Why is it the school run has such an impact on traffic?
Drove up the A1(M) from the caravan yesterday morning, leaving before 7am.
The road was noticeably busier than it was last week at that time, even though the school day was not due to start for two hours.
Same this morning leaving from Ifithelps Towers.
My journey to work - and that of many others - has been a pleasure these last few weeks.
It would continue to be so - if it wasn't for those pesky kids.
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>> if it wasn't for those pesky kids.
Agatha Trunchbull: They're all mistakes, children! Filthy, nasty things. Glad I never was one.
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Yeah, I live near a couple of skools and I noticed the 100 fold increase in traffic on Monday morn,
This plaice is going 'on the market' today and I've got my beedie eye on a barn perversion in the middle of nowhere!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfWEPu0w-7w
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I do wonder where all of this traffic disappears to when the kids are on holiday.
Obviously some parents will be off taking care of the kids so that would be one less car on the road.
But realisticly no parent can take six weeks off work to look after them, so where does the traffic go ?
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>> Why is it the school run has such an impact on traffic?
>>
>> Drove up the A1(M) from the caravan yesterday morning, leaving before 7am.
>>
>> The road was noticeably busier than it was last week at that time, even though
>> the school day was not due to start for two hours.
>>
Darlington was more or less gridlocked this morning, 1st time its been like that in around 6 weeks.
Funny that, how for some reason when the schools are back on traffic trebles(?) i assume that most parents still have to go to work - so where does the traffic go? one wonders
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>>>But realisticly no parent can take six weeks off work to look after them...
Non working Mum's.... there are loads in our area.... so they're all off the road at commute time... but heading for McDonalds at 11.45.
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It's not just school runs that make the roads busier. Don't forget that during the school hols many parents have to take time off, and so they are not commuting to work in the normal way.
I find the busiest time on the roads is September to Christmas - everyone seems to be at work earning for the big day.
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Mega big University, college, school area round here so everyone's off work.
The roads are dead for 6 weeks.
Very quiet today, though......some might not be back 'til Monday
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...and of course all the teachers and other staff aren't commuting when the schools are off either. That alone must take a fair few cars off the road at very specific times.
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S'funny, when I went to the 'big' school when I was 11, we all made our own way there, and my school wasn't local,
I lived in Camberwell, walked to the bus stop *in all weathers*,
got the bus to Herne Hill then another good walk to William Penn Comp.
Same for the junior school ~ shank's pony.
Kids today, well - they've never had it, so ~ good!
Last edited by: Dog on Wed 8 Sep 10 at 19:52
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I had a three mile walk to school but I could go and come back on the bus;it cost three half pence each way but if I walked I had a whole three pence to spend;guess what I did?
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10 Regal and a bottle of Tizer. A Glasgow picnic.
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I cycled five miles each way to and from school which was in Edinburgh city centre from the age of 9 onwards. Some nights I'd go back again if there was an evening activity. Only got run over the once. By a cement mixer lorry as it happens. Don't remember it though. Woke up in hospital three days later. Apart from that it was fine.
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Pesky kids or pesky parents?
Is no-one else amused by the Telegraph article reporting that supermarket "Parent and child" parking bays are now "a source of stress, apoplexy and the sort of angry exchanges usually reserved for The Jeremy Kyle Show"?
Apparently, parents are now arguing about what constitutes a child for parking purposes.
Kevin...
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well i am not amused
but then again i dont eat a lot of cake
i see those spots as mainly used by the people i avoid to be honest both in retail and social circles
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I am fortunate that my legs work so I don't have to park anywhere near the disputed parking slots. Saves a whole lot of hassle parking well away from the door where the car park tends to be almost empty.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Thu 9 Sep 10 at 22:40
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Exactly ON. By similarly parking at the far end of the supermarket car park away from the detritus of society I can justify that extra donut (or apple in my case).
conceitedly yours
LL
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I used to walk the mile or so to junior school come hell or high water. When I went to comprehensive school my parents bought me a bike to cycle the 2 miles.
I've mentioned this before but where I used to work in Cheshire was opposite the local school. I used to walk to work which took me around 10 minutes along a footpath and over a pedestrian bridge. Driving to the same destination required a detour onto the local bypass resulting in a journey time of up to 35 minutes depending on traffic. I know this from personal experience but also because one of my neighbours used to drive her son to the school and then drive home again. Before repeating the operation in the afternoon.
I once asked her why she did this rather than just kicking him out of the house at 8:30. "Because it's dangerous", she replied. Why didn't she walk with him rather than drive? "Because it's cold."
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>>>But realisticly no parent can take six weeks off work to look after them...
They don't have to. Around our way lots of parents stagger their holidays so that the six week period would be something like this:
Two weeks holiday all together.
Grandparents, friends etc. help out and muddle through for a week with a bit of so-called 'working' from home.
Then Mum takes a week off with Dad still at work.
The reverse.
Grandparents, friends etc. help out and muddle through for a week with a bit of so-called 'working' from home.
In the old days we never had to bother with all this. Living costs, particularly housing, were sufficiently low to mean if the second parent worked it was because they wanted to rather than needed to.
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>> In the old days we never had to bother with all this. Living costs, particularly
>> housing, were sufficiently low to mean if the second parent worked it was because they
>> wanted to rather than needed to.
Not just that, i was the sole breadwinner for many years but did the hours and work of 2+ people, 60 to 100 hour weeks quite normal, i wasn't alone lots of working men did the same...learned by example from our fathers what a fathers duty is maybe?
We could never have got by on a 40 hour week and in that respect nothing has changed, but people and what the expect they deserve have.
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Infant and junior school I walked. After that I biked. In junior school only one mother, that I know of, had a car and picked up little Johnny (Peter actually). I don't think my Dad had a car at the time. No one thought that walking to school unaccompanied was abnormal or dangerous.
On the other hand there seems to be a lack of local schools these days, they're all mega factories with a significant trip for many children. School buses are now commonplace, I just don't remember them existing when i was at school.
I suspect that the mega factories also encourage bullying and other forms of bad behaviour as you're one face in a crowd, far less likely to be known individually than is the case in a smaller school.
So parents are to blame and our local politicians. Education is a football, I do wish the politicians, unions and other vested interests would leave it alone.
John
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>>The Jeremy Kyle Show"?
Accidentally tuned into that a few days ago... are many people really like that or do they have to trawl the depths of Society to find the odd few (very ODD!)?
Back to the OP, I think Bagpuss got it right with:
"I once asked her why she did this rather than just kicking him out of the house at 8:30. "Because it's dangerous", she replied. Why didn't she walk with him rather than drive? "Because it's cold."
Says it all!
Last edited by: hobby on Wed 6 Oct 10 at 08:59
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>>The Jeremy Kyle Show"?
Accidentally tuned into that a few days ago... are many people really like that or do they have to trawl the depths of Society to find the odd few (very ODD!)?
Since retiring I noticed the town seemed full of contestants perfect for that show. When I stopped to think about it, all the 'normal' people are probably at work and in education.
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I don't want to be normal, if by normal you mean the majority (and I refer once again to Jerome K Jerome, The New Utopia). Have you seen what normal people do? :-)
John
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>> Why is it the school run has such an impact on traffic?
Routines alter, and much has to be accomplished before the school day starts at about 10 to 9.
That, and the fact that most mummy drivers (perhaps "under the circumstances, I'm feeling generous) are a bunch of incompetent yet pushy drivers and selfish (expletive deleted).
Last edited by: FotheringtonTomas on Tue 5 Oct 10 at 22:19
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>> That, and the fact that most mummy drivers (perhaps "under the circumstances, I'm feeling generous)
>> are a bunch of incompetent yet pushy drivers and selfish (expletive deleted).
>>
Agreed. Particularly the incompetent bit.
Last edited by: Old Navy on Tue 5 Oct 10 at 22:23
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My upper school was four miles from home, and I cycled it. In the 14 years I was in full time education, I was driven to school twice, once because of snow, and the other because my mum happened to be going that way, and I was late.
Even people who came in from other towns to my upper school used to take the bus. I recall, out of a school of about 400 pupils, there were maybe half a dozen whose parents drove them to school, and not one of those lived less than 10 miles away. This was 1988-1993 so not exactly the halcyon days of apple scrumping and Mr. Cholmondley-Warner ;-). It's remarkable how times change so quickly.
Last edited by: DP on Wed 6 Oct 10 at 09:38
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Those pesky kids - FotheringtonTomas
