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Sund Skolevej

RECOMMENDATIONS

Based on analysis with 11,000 participating students/parents.

Healthier routes to school through a focus on safety.


Lower speed limits at schools, walking and cycling as the primary consideration and more dialogue with parents about safety experiences on the way to school. These are some of the recommendations highlighted in the report from the Healthy School Road project, which has conducted a comprehensive study of children's and families' transport habits and transport motives in collaboration with 9 municipalities. More than 11,000 children and parents have participated in the study. The recommendations that have emerged from the project are grouped into three themes. The themes arise from critical factors that the analysis has shown to be important for transport choices. The report's recommendations are not a checklist, but a good starting point for creating more active transport.


The themes are:


1. Security

The theme is about focusing on safety for road users. It is about dialogue with users and taking safety from a user perspective seriously. Basically, safety and user focus are about promoting well-being, welfare and health on the way to school. Safety and security can be, but do not have to be, opposites, as long as the solutions meet both requirements.


2. Road conditions

The theme is about school roads that prioritize light traffic and prioritize facilities that make active transportation comfortable, safe and fast. Passive transportation on school roads must be designed to accommodate active transportation, even where it may be experienced as a loss of privileges for drivers on school roads.


3. Stimulation

The theme is about other things that can motivate healthy transport choices. Schools and parents, for example, have a shared responsibility to stimulate children's desire for active transport as early as possible. Stimulation is also about prioritizing and the practical things that can be done to facilitate, promote and reward active transport.

THE BARRIER TO ACTIVE TRANSPORT MUST BE LOWERED

If we want to get children out of cars, we need to understand walking and cycling as the primary mode of transportation to school and cars to school as secondary.


For historical reasons, our cities are designed on the premises of the car, while pedestrians and cyclists must adapt to the consideration of cars. This situation must be reversed so that there can be more active transport in general. This must happen both in the individual city - and in relation to traffic regulation, urban development and through political priorities on infrastructure. Active transport is about urban planning, infrastructure and traffic regulation and about designing cities and traffic areas so that active transport occurs naturally, safely and easily.


Danish families with children want to cycle and walk. Unfortunately, conditions are not always conducive to this preference. The main problem is partly the self-reinforcing use of cars for school transport, and partly that the infrastructure does not consistently support and favour light road users to and around school.


In general, the Healthy School Road project recommends that politicians in each municipality make a decision that active school transport - walking and cycling - should be the natural and primary transport choice to school, and that cars must comply with the requirements for safety, well-being and security on the school route that are necessary to promote active and healthy transport.

Sund Skolevej recommends

THE SCHOOL PATH OF THE FUTURE

The school routes of the future should be characterized by active transportation with well-being, safety and quality of life for road users. To achieve this goal, the report recommends working with these themes:


1. Safety - safety in dialogue with traffic users
2. Road conditions – traffic areas that prioritize active transportation
3. Simulation – initiatives that stimulate more active transport

SAFETY

Safety on the way to school is the single biggest factor in choosing a mode of transport. When traffic is experienced as unsafe, the car is more often the chosen mode of transport to school, even for short distances. Safety and actual road safety can sometimes be opposites, but they do not have to be. To ensure that it is not a lack of safety that is decisive in choosing the car as a means of transport, insecurity among children and parents should be taken seriously. In this context, we recommend dialogue with road users as a starting point for safety-creating efforts.

 

  • Use safety as a success parameter for school transport

  • Get ideas from traffic users – a lot of insecurity can be solved with simple measures

  • Walk & Talk events where children and parents identify unsafe places and situations

  • Family review of the school route once a year for dialogue about safe routes to school

 

Cars as the main source of insecurity

 

Cars on the school route are the single biggest source of insecurity on the school route and thus often the primary argument for driving your children to school yourself. Cars on the school route will often be a premise that cannot be fundamentally changed. Even if cars were to be banned from entering the school grounds, there will still be stretches of the school route where cars must be able to drive. But the conditions can often be significantly improved in favor of safe and more secure active transport.

 

  • Introduce 30 km/h on roads around schools

  • Combine speed limits with speed reduction measures

  • Use electronic speedometers that display speed and log speed data

  • Ensure clear and visible crossing points on the school route

  • Separate car entrances and parking from light traffic

  • Create a safe distance between cars and light traffic

  • Combat illegal driving through targeted road design

  • Create visibility and respect at pedestrian crossings

ROAD CONDITIONS

Road conditions that prioritize active transportation


The study shows that cycle paths are important for the use of active school transport and the experience of safety in traffic, especially when the school route includes heavy traffic and country roads. Intersections and crossings are also of great importance, where even a single unsafe crossing can be an obstacle to active transport choice. Poor maintenance of traffic areas for light road users – cycle paths and pavements – also easily becomes a source of frustration for active school transport users.

  • Where bike lanes are not possible, use some alternatives

  • Use the Walk & Talk concept to find unsafe places in traffic

  • Upgrade the operation of pedestrian and cycle paths to the same level as for motorised traffic

    • Keep the bike path clean

    • Keep the bike path intact

    • Provide winter protection

    • Provide lighting on pedestrian and bicycle routes

STIMULATION OF ACTIVE TRANSPORT

Many factors can hinder active transport. Including children's lack of desire to walk or cycle and good arguments about bad weather and busyness. For some parents, it is also a barrier if the child is not old enough to walk / cycle on their own or is not comfortable with taking the trip on their own. It is recommended that schools and parents ensure that children are given the opportunity to experience the joy of movement and help them to become motivated and safe active road users. It is also recommended to introduce accompanying schemes that relieve parents of the burden of accompanying their children to school on foot and by bicycle.

 

  • Strengthen school activities that train and stimulate cycling

  • Let older siblings accompany younger ones to school

  • Offer walking and bike buses with adult volunteers

  • Make agreements between parents about accompanying children to school

  • Make sure to keep parents informed each school year

  • Keep the school bag light – children should not have to carry heavy loads

  • Offer attractive public transport to students outside the cities

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