Agenda item - Safe & Sustainable Travel to Schools

Report of the Executive Director, Children’s Services (copy attached).

1)           That Members note the Council’s school travel management activities, the adopted policy and the School Travel Planning procedures being followed.

2)           That Members endorse the proposals described under ‘Next Steps’ and summarised below:

·         To establish robust data sources that enable the School Travel Advisors to guide schools on the ways that they can support and maintain lower car use for the trip to/from school – especially the sharing of post code data between service teams as a priority;

·         To target  parking/anti-social driving enforcement based on a proven need approach, where enforcement complements other measures in the School Travel Plan;

·         Continued collaborative working between Road Safety and Public Health officers to achieve healthy, active lifestyles and meet performance targets for public health;

·         The promotion of School Travel Plan development by Children & Young People’s Services to all city schools.

11.1      The Committee considered a report of the Executive Director of Children’s Services that informed Members of the work with schools to reduce the use of cars to take children to and from school and advised Members of the policy for managing school travel adopted by the Council as part of the Safer Roads Strategy 2015-2020. Furthermore, the report informed Members of the procedural approach being followed by the Road Safety Team to support schools with their efforts to reduce reliance upon private car use for the journey to and from school and the development and maintenance of School Travel Plans.

11.2      Councillor Brown asked for confirmation that there were eleven School Travel Plans as she remembered this figure being higher in previous years.

11.3      The Road Safety Manager confirmed that there were currently eleven plans. This figure had reduced as the government funding available to produce the Plans had ceased and gradually schools had stopped producing them. The work of the Road Safety Team was to help refresh the Plans with a revised approach.

11.4      Councillor Wealls asked if there was any monitoring process to ensure that the Plans were working effectively.

11.5      The Road Safety Manager replied that the best method of analysis was an examination in the shift of modal share and the Road Safety Team requested that schools report to them on how pupils were travelling to school.

11.6      Councillor Phillips noted that enforcement spot checks had been a success and asked if more were planned and if more yellow lines would be an additional deterrent for anti-social parking. Furthermore, Councillor Phillips asked if there was an intention to allow for monitoring by volunteers.

11.7      The Road Safety Manager stated that the council had run a series of announced spot checks and enforcement that had been very successful and made a difference with established behaviours. The Road Manager added that the preferred approach was to inform motorists of correct parking and driving behaviours rather than ticketing and that School Travel Plans would likely achieve more success in the long-term than increased enforcement. The Road Safety Manager added that he was not aware of volunteer monitoring and whilst it was not currently being considered, such an approach may be considered if it was deemed beneficial to a particular situation.

11.8      The Chair stated that whilst he agreed that creating a change in behaviours was the long-term solution, he also believed that the community could help on issues of road safety.

11.9      Martin Jones asked if ad-hoc, temporary signage may be a solution.

11.10   The Road Safety Manager stated that some authorities had adopted time-limited speed zones but this was hard to enforce and there were also legal restrictions on what the local authority could display. The Road Safety Team gave constant consideration to potential infrastructure changes to the physical environment to change driver perception.

11.11   Councillor Barradell stated that bus services were a particular problem in the East Brighton area where lots of pupils were travelling to school using an inconsistent service. Councillor Barradell asked if this could be given consideration in the ‘Next Steps’ section.

11.12   The Road Safety Manager replied that given the limited resources currently available, the Road Safety Team were currently focussing their work at primary school level but secondary school travel would be considered later in the programme and that would be the type of issue to be challenged.

11.13   Councillor Daniel stated that she agreed that bus travel in East Brighton was a significant issue and she was aware that some parents would not choose Brighton Aldridge Community Academy as a school preference due to the limited transport options available.

11.14   The Assistant Director - Education & Inclusion clarified that the current review of the school admissions arrangements would be looking at a number of issues including bus services and there were ongoing discussions as part of the Supported Bus Network work.

11.15   RESOVLED-

1)           That Members note the Council’s school travel management activities, the adopted policy and the School Travel Planning procedures being followed.

2)           That Members endorse the proposals described under ‘Next Steps’ and summarised below:

·         To establish robust data sources that enable the School Travel Advisors to guide schools on the ways that they can support and maintain lower car use for the trip to/from school – especially the sharing of post code data between service teams as a priority;

·         To target  parking/anti-social driving enforcement based on a proven need approach, where enforcement complements other measures in the School Travel Plan;

·         Continued collaborative working between Road Safety and Public Health officers to achieve healthy, active lifestyles and meet performance targets for public health;

·         The promotion of School Travel Plan development by Children & Young People’s Services to all city schools.