The school run restart fills me with dread, as a parent and resident

Enjoy the holiday heatwaves while you can. It won’t be long before parents of school age kids are climbing back into their cars for the school run ritual to begin again. 

As a parent who does the school run and lives within forked sausage throwing range of a school, I’ve seen the chaos from all sides, and am in a good position to call for a little perspective and understanding.

My Grange Hill reference may have sailed over the heads of our more youthful readers, much like the famous cutlery pierced banger from the BBC TV school drama’s opening credits, and they may also struggle to remember a time when journeys to school were less likely to involve a car. 

In the mid seventies, around 67% of school children walked to school and that fell to a low of 43% in 2014, before climbing to 47% in 2022, when 33% of those who didn’t walk went by car.   

Back in the eighties, when Grange Hill was in its pomp, kids weren’t herded into cars for short journeys as regularly as they are today. Back then, though, the pace of life was slower, with fewer households requiring two incomes, and kids generally had more freedom to be out and about on their own. 

Without getting into the sociology of it or harping on about the good old days, the rise of the school run is a modern phenomenon. Parents need to get children to school, then themselves to work, and the car is the obvious answer for many. 

I am one of them, and I feel the pain. Getting young (or old, to be honest) kids up, clothed, breakfasted, shoed and out the door feels like a day’s work in itself. Then you get behind the wheel with the little lovelies invariably doing something they shouldn’t be in the back seat. You roll out onto roads already clogged with lots of others attempting a similar thing, plus drivers heading to work or making deliveries, cyclists, pedestrians... It’s the perfect storm, but heading back to harbour isn’t an option. 

It all means more stress, and stress often equals bad decisions. From my house opposite the primary school my own kids went to for seven years – but have now left for the big secondary across town – I’ve seen a lot of the latter: Shocking parking – on the zig-zag ‘no stopping’ zones, on double yellow lines and across residents’ driveways; stopping in the middle of the road or blocking pavements; speeding in what is a 20mph zone thronging with children… it all goes on, and more often than you’d think. 

When time is short and the pressure is on, some people’s reservations about bending or breaking the rules of the road ebb away. For naughtiness behind the wheel, a minority of school run dads and mums rival the boy racers sitting outside McDonald’s Drive-Thru in their modified Corsas.

So, I know it’s easier said than done, but before we kick it all off again, let’s try to have some pause for thought. Give yourself more time to make that school run journey, park and deposit the kids safely. Think about other road users, pedestrians and residents. If it’s not too far and the weather’s nice, maybe you could even walk? 

Now let’s forget about ‘back to school’ and enjoy the rest of the holidays. 

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