A ‘School Streets’ initiative trial has come into force at the St Mary and St John School in Meadow Lane in Oxford this week.
As a result of the scheme, Bedford Street by Argle Street is closed to motorists at school pick-up and drop-off times.
Exceptions have been extended to residents with vehicles registered to an address on the street, blue badge holders, emergency vehicles, and council-organised home-to-school transport for students with “additional needs”.
Oxfordshire County Council describes school streets as an “active travel initiative to create safer and healthier car free environments outside schools across the county”.
Bedford Street by Argle Street in Oxford
Surprisingly, a small group of parents have been “turning up 45 minutes early” to drop their children off at school and “beat the system” after the car ban was implemented.
St Mary’s ward Green councillor Emily Kerr said: “Until this week, a certain number of parents would drive to the bottom of the cul de sac and manoeuvre. We’ve had kids hit by cars, fights, police called.
“I’ve genuinely been incredibly amused at the tiny group of parents who are ‘beating the system’ by arriving 45 minutes early to avoid the volunteers and, therefore, spending nearly an hour in their cars outside the school to avoid walking 50m.
“Talk about a phyrric victory.”
The St Mary and St John school says it is still on the lookout for trial volunteers to enforce the scheme.
This comes following the implementation of an Experimental Traffic Regulation Order (ETRO), meaning the restrictions will last for 18 months before a decision is made on whether to make them permanent.
Automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras are used to enforce rules in existing school streets, but there have been concerns of “volunteer fatigue” in other schools where volunteers have been used to trial the system.
School streets were first launched in Oxfordshire in 2021 with a six-week trial at nine schools.
Volunteers operated temporary ‘pop-up’ gates during the trial, after which four of the schools decided to make the rules permanent.
Ms Kerr concluded: “The school streets scheme is designed to make the area outside the school gates safer during pick up and drop off time by limiting cars and other motor vehicles.
“The first week has gone really well with parents thanking us and the system seems to be working well so far, though the County Council will collect feedback from parents and residents after a few weeks to check if there are any unforeseen issues.”
St Mary and St John School has been contacted for comments.
