Spreading The Love For Cycling The School Run
When you start to cycle the school run, you might just find you love it. You will also probably be noticed as someone who cycles to school, especially if you have an unusual bike. When that happens, don’t be surprised if other parents start to ask your advice. It is time to encourage others to cycle the school run.
Why Bother?
If your route to school involves roads, they are probably pretty busy at school run times. From a purely self-centred point of view, the more families who choose to switch to cycling instead of driving, the less cars are on the road at school run times of day and the more relaxed cycling can be.
But there’s more to it than self-interest. Amongst your school community there will be those who drive the school run and will always do so. There are many perfectly valid reasons for doing so and quite frankly these reasons are nobody else’s business. As long as drivers are driving responsibly there isn’t really a problem with this.
There are also likely to be a substantial number of families who would like to cycle the school run but do not do so…yet. These are the people you need to spread the love to. Think back to when you first considered cycling the school run and remember how daunting it seemed. From not knowing what bike(s) to use, to dealing with other road users, to uncertainty about practicalities, there is a lot to think about if you are not a regular cyclist already.
Encouraging others to cycle the school run is not about banning cars. It is not about forcing people to cycle. It is about enabling those people who would like to cycle but who lack the means to do so at the moment.
What Can You Do?
I firmly believe the greatest thing any of us can do to encourage others to cycle, is to cycle. Show that it is possible.
Beyond this, there are initiatives you could look at to support other families.
Know Your Local Area
Sometimes all it takes to get someone cycling is for them to find out where to take their bike for a service. Lots of people have a bike lurking at the back of a garage or shed for the past twenty years. If you have a great local bike shop, tell people about it. Ask the school if you can put up a poster for the shop or hand out flyers. You could always ask the shop if they would consider running a promotion for families linked to the school.
If you are lucky enough to have fantastic initiatives like The Bike Station in your area, tell everyone about these too. Buying a new bike can be prohibitively expensive so finding out where to buy a reliable affordable second hand bike can be all it takes.
If you have found a great route to school, talk to other families who live near you about it. Traffic-free paths are not always brilliantly signposted and a good route is worth sharing.
Speak To Your School Management Team
Ideally you want the management of your children’s school to be on board with promoting active travel.
‘Bling your bike day’ – and the teachers got involved too
I have been really lucky with my children’s school. Several of the staff themselves cycle and they are all for encouraging others. We have a Parent Council with a ‘School Travel Action Group’ where school staff and parents work together to support active travel, including cycling. One of my favourite projects with the School Travel Group was celebrating the installation of new bike and scooter racks at the school (part funded by the Sustrans School Cycle and Scooter Parking Fund) with a ‘Bling Your Bike Day’
If your children’s school management team are reluctant to promote cycling, it is worth speaking to them about their concerns. It might be that they are worried about bike storage and safety. It might be that they simply have not considered this – schools are really busy places. Just as you can support other families to cycle through talking to them and showing the possibilities, you can support the school to see the potential positive impact of cycling for their school community.
Most schools in the UK run bikeability at some point in the year. This is what used to be called cycling proficiency and it is a great thing to support children to cycle. Ask your school if they run this, and even better ask if you can volunteer to help them with it. Schools rarely say no to the offer of help.
There are lots of initiatives out there to support and encourage active travel to school. Ask your school if they would consider taking part in some of those listed below. Again, if you can help with, most schools will jump at the chance.
Active Travel Initiatives:
- Cycling Friendly School Awards (Scotland)
- Bike To School Week
- The Big Pedal
- Walk to School Week
- Clean Air Day
- Road Safety Week
Help Write A School Travel Plan
Writing a good School Travel Plan can be a lot of work. However, it can also open doors for funding and get things done. A School Travel Plan should be an active document which sets out what the school wants to achieve, the evidence behind the plans, and what steps are going to be taken when. All schools should have an up to date School Travel Plan.
You can find out more and buy a pack which sets out exactly how to write a great School Travel Plan here (full disclosure – this is created by me)
Campaign For Better Infrastructure
Chances are you do not have a fully-segregated cycle path to your local school. Really good infrastructure DOES get more people cycling. If you don’t have this in your area, start demanding it. Speak to your Local Councillors, join the Community Council, petition your MP. Engage with local consultations on infrastructure improvements – the people planning them don’t always take school travel into account. Chances are there will already be others in your local area who are doing this. Seek then out and support them.
Speak to everyone who will listen about it. Only please, don’t waste your energy ranting needlessly on Twitter!
Set Up A Bike Bus
Bike buses to schools are now catching on across the UK which is fantastic.
A bike bus involves a group of adults and children cycling together along a set route to school. People can join the ‘bus’ at the start of the route, or at a number of ‘stops’ along the way. They are great fun to run and a brilliant way to support families who might want to try cycling the school run, but lack the confidence or the route knowledge.
Kids LOVE bike buses! What better way to start the day than to cycle to school with your pals.
If you are reading this and thinking sounds great but no way, that’s far too tricky to do then believe me, I know where you are coming from. I did not particularly want to set up a bike bus myself. But when I was persuaded to give it a go I found that, not only was it not that tricky at all, I absolutely loved doing it.
You can read about my experience and find an in depth guide to setting up and running your own bike bus in my article, ‘The Reluctant Bike Bus Organiser’.
Organise Led Rides
People lack the confidence to cycle for many reasons. They might feel wobbly or confused by all those gears. They might be scared of the other traffic on the roads. They might just not of been on a bike for a long time. They might be scared of getting a puncture.
If you do not have the confidence to ride a bike yourself, then you are certainly not going to have the confidence to ride with your children.
Build your confidence on a Breeze ride
I have been involved with the British Cycling Breeze programme for a number of years and I absolutely love it. Through a network of wonderful volunteers, Breeze puts on free led rides for women. Breeze rides are women-only in response to an overwhelming demand for this to combat the fact that women are massively in the minority when it comes to riding bikes. These are great rides to go along to if you are a woman who would like to cycle more or get started cycling.
I am very proud to say that I have seen many women develop their confidence on Breeze rides to the point where they are perfectly happy to cycle on their own – and with their children. I have also been able to show people local routes and traffic free paths which they might otherwise not have found.
There is no great secret to building another person’s confidence on a bike – just being a confident cyclist and riding with them will do the trick. If you can manage to get a cake stop in there too (we love cake stops on Breeze rides) then so much the better!
Breeze Champions attend a free training day which qualifies them as Ride Leaders and also insures them as leaders. If you think you might be interested in getting involved in the programme you can read more in my article ‘Championing The Cause Of Women’s Cycling‘. British Cycling also run a Guided Rides programme which is open to all.
While I would highly recommend the British Cycling Ride Leader qualification (again full disclosure – I tutor these courses for British Cycling), you do not need to be a ride leader to take other people out on bikes. If you know of someone else who is thinking about cycling the school run, why not offer to go for a cycle with them and help them find a route?
Ride That Bike
All the suggestions above can be really enjoyable, but they do take time. When you have children time is something which can be in short supply.
Remember, the best thing you can do to spread the love for cycling is to cycle.
And that really is enjoyable.
Cycling The School Run Articles
This series of articles are based on a talk I gave in August 2020 for Greener Kirkcaldy. If listening is your thing, you can access the recording here.
The articles follow a kind of order as shown below, but can also be read in isolation. If you have questions or comments I would love to hear them and will follow them up with further articles if I can.
