Mammy dropping kids to school in the car

My kids both walk, cycle or scooter to school and back. I walk with them to school as my daughter who is in Senior Infants would still be a bit young, my son (9) walks home from school by himself. Now I will clarify that I only live literally 5 mins from the school which is in a rural village.

When my daughter goes into 1st Class in September and finishes at the same time as my son I will allow them to walk to and from school together by themselves. I'm a stay at home parent so could easily drop and collect them but I feel it's important for them to have some independence without having their parents scrutinising what they are doing. Some of the best fun I remember having with friends was walking to and from school.

I would go up and collect them if it were lashing raining though.

Still interested in seeing that photo of "many" people cycling with 2 or 3 the same size on the same bike, each one with a heavy bag ... :)

What? They are way more likely to develop a fear of heights from some heights based trauma not because their parents kept them safe

Basically it take about around 5-6 mins a mile at a slow pace. If they play sports they'll be running for 30~60 mins. Its actually no distance on a bicycle. You'd think nothing of it in a park.

The issue is more if a its suitable route. Infrastructure.

Plenty of parents are heading home to bed or off to coffee after as well

The issue is the ones who dont need to be there and for the ones that do, its the me fein i need to park right at the gate and block everyone else that is the issue

3-5k is easy for infants and then further as they get older, probably few enough further than that from primary anyway in cities or country

walking bus

let 2/3 parents supervise 20 children walking the last 3km to school

park away from school and walk there together.

My kids school is accross two fields from where they live so no issues there walking going to school.

But when we were going to the same school when we were young we lived in a house just a few hundred meters down the road from there.

You couldnt go across that field then because there was no bridge on the river at the time. So you used to have to walk 1km to the old bridge along the road.

We used to play football on the road on the way to and from school, with goals in the middle of the road there was that little traffic. That was about 30 years ago.

I cycle that road now every day now and im afraid for my life with the traffic on it now.

No way would i let a child walk along that road nowadays.

Again admission polices and infrastructure.

And I'll add as part of infrastructure we are creating lifestyles and planning infrastructure that gives people no choice except to drive.

Look at wfh. That must stop a lot driving to school and to work. But there's huge resistance to it. Building massive estates with no school provision. No jobs nearby.

When I was young practically obody had two cars. Dads generally had a car and drove it to work, mammys stayed at home with the kids. Now for better or worse lots of families, I’d say most but not sure, both parents work and usually have two cars. Often they drop on the way to work. Cars take up an enormous amount of space so it looks like everyone is driving when it’s not at all. 50/60 cars pulling up to a school take up a huge amount of space but they might only account for 100 pupils with another 150 walking or cycling. Whilst I think it’s a problem I think a lot is perception. Your use of the word seems is spot on.

Well not really unless the school is exactly on the route from the house to work. So there might be the same amount of cars, although obviously a bit less because there are plenty who just drop to school and go home, on the road but the journeys will be direct so less traffic going to the schools and back to the route to work. Plus schools all tend to have roughly the same start times so it adds to the timing but parents not dropping may leave a bit earlier depending on how their hours work.

It's not a slight difference. It's a dramatic difference.

A common failing in this country is an unwillingness or inability to purchase and wear proper rain gear. Its hard for some to understand but there are countries far wetter and colder than this one and *gasp* people actually live in them.