Children’s travel matters, and that's why it must be properly measured

Nicola Pastore explains why she is leading a campaign to reinstate the collection of travel to school data in the census

In 2011 the government stopped collecting data on how children travel to school. With the government failing to meet its walking to school targets, as was revealed last month¹, isn’t it time for them to bring back this measurement?

As schools return this September, so does the onslaught of school run traffic, creating congestion in city streets, delaying public buses and sending air pollution sky rocketing.

In England 43% of primary pupils and 30% of secondary pupils² are driven to school and the school run car trips generated make up over 25%³ of morning peak time traffic. 

In a South East London junction, the congestion generated by the school run has been linked to a staggering 50%⁴ increase in air pollution. And if you’re catching a bus to work, analysis from the same location showed your journey is going to take you over 50% longer during term time as the school holidays. Whether you are grappling with getting your kids to school, commuting to work, or out for a run, we are all affected by school run traffic.

Creating ‘fear of missing out’ (FOMO)

National Active Travel Commissioner Chris Boardman recently said that he wanted to create “fear of missing out” when it comes to school active travel. “If we get to a point where x per cent of kids in an area have the freedom to walk or ride to school, I think we'll see parents in neighbouring streets and communities thinking, ‘hang on, why can’t we have that’,” he said⁵.

We agree – parents should absolutely have this information. They should be outraged that their children can’t walk or cycle to school independently, or get an easily available school bus, like they can in so many other developed countries. Instead, in England, a quick Google of “zebra crossings” and “schools” brings up pictures of parents and children up and down the country dressing up in zebra suits to demand safer crossings outside schools. These are scenes that would be almost farcical if the stakes weren’t so high. In April this year, over 40 MPs attended the “road safety and active travel to school” parliamentary debate⁶ to pass on the impassioned pleas from their constituents for these essential daily journeys to be safer.  

Perhaps the most harrowing representation of all came from Matt Western, MP for Warwick & Leamington, who relayed how a school in his constituency had “opened without even a direct footpath to the site, and certainly no cycleway”. Western told MPs: “Sadly, within four weeks, there was a serious accident involving a child who had to be airlifted some 60 miles.”

Public, accessible and transparent data on how children are getting to school, as we have seen in many other sectors, would enable public awareness of the issues to grow and provide the scrutiny needed to hold authorities to account and drive progress.   

This could follow the same lines as school league tables that showcase clear, comparative data on metrics like Ofsted reports and exam results. Parents pour over this information and are even willing to pay for enhanced access.   

“Location” and “convenience” regularly rank as some of the most important factors for families choosing a school⁷ indicating how important the journey to school is. Imagine if the numbers of children walking and cycling to schools could be compared in these league tables in the same way?

We are, however, a long way away from this being possible.

Fit for purpose data

From 2008 - 2011, the Department of Education collected data on how each child travelled to school. It did this as part of the annual school census that returns individual level data on various pupil characteristics, collected and submitted by schools. The child’s mode of travel to school was captured by school staff and submitted along with health metrics such as child height and weight. 

However, in 2011, a decision was made to remove the requirement to capture how children travel to school. So, whilst the government continues to collect outcome health data at child level, such as obesity rates, which show us an alarming deterioration in children’s health, they have stopped measuring an important driver in improving these health outcomes –  children’s active travel to school.

So, what travel to school data is available currently? There are two main data sources. The first is the National Travel Survey⁸ which is compiled by the Department for Transport using a sample survey of parents. This is effective for understanding nationwide trends on how children are travelling to school. However, currently the sample size is too small to offer a sense of what is happening at region or city level.

Even if a larger sample boost made this possible, it would never get down to the local school level, which is needed to create that  “fear of missing out” factor for parents. Without the school level or neighbourhood level information, it’s also not possible to systematically evaluate how local transport schemes such as bike lanes or school streets are impacting the school run.

The second available data source is school level information that is submitted by schools as part of Transport for London’s Travel for Life along with the Modeshift Stars schemes. School staff collect information on how children travel to school often via a show of hands from each class. The data is available at school level but not by individual child. This data source is an effective way for each school to evaluate its own progress on reducing school run driving, and the collective data set is useful in evaluating the overall progress of schools engaged in these schemes. This data is also shared with local authorities that can feed it into their school active travel programs. 

However, as a means to generate public, accessible, comparatives these methods are limited. The Travel for Life and Modeshift Stars data is only available for a certain percentage of schools, so there are significant data gaps. The schools that do opt into these programmes and collect their mode of travel data are likely to be those inherently more engaged with active travel, which means their travel results may contain bias. And, lastly, inconsistent methods are used to collect the data. Schools often complete their travel surveys at different times of the year and at different frequencies, making comparatives difficult.

A game-changer for active travel

Comprehensive child-level measurement of travel to school could be a game-changer for active travel on the school run.

Child level data on school travel, collected systematically from every school as part of the school census could provide a public, integrated view on how far children are travelling and what mode of travel they are using. This would enable comparatives for every school, ward, city and region in England.  

You can get a sense of what this could look like by checking out our publicly available London primary school travel dashboard. This type of data availability would mean: 

• The public would be informed and could hold local authorities to account on progress in their areas.   
• We could learn from success; children’s travel independence is a gift to parents, this data could put a spotlight on the areas doing well and create a race to the top.
• Local authorities and national government could use the data to make evidence-based decisions about where to direct resources.
• Researchers could conduct high quality systemic evaluations of new policies and solutions such as school streets, low traffic neighbourhoods, cycle lanes and cargo bikes.

To create FOMO we need to make the data public and digestible. Accessibility and digestibility of the data is just as important as the data being collected in the first place. Ultimately, even if you have the most detailed, reliable dataset, it is of limited value if it is buried in the depths of  impenetrable files. We need children’s travel to school to be public, prominent, easily available information for parents and school travel stakeholders. It should be available on school websites, council websites and in school and health league tables, so families can see what they’re missing out on and drive change.

‘You can’t manage what you can’t measure’

Just as we have seen how public monitoring and tracking of air pollution has greatly increased public awareness and concern over the issue, so we should be applying the same approach to the school run.  

Currently we don’t have the granularity of data and public accessibility to understand what neighbourhoods, towns or regions in England are doing well, where is being left behind, and what policies and solutions are having a successful impact. As the old adage goes, “you can't manage what you can’t measure”. Children’s travel matters, and it deserves to be measured well.

Nicola Pastore is co-founder of Solve the School Run, a charity devoted to enabling families to have safe, green and convenient school runs. To join the campaign to reinstate the collection of children’s travel to school data in the school census email: hello@solvetheschoolrun.org.

1 https://www.livingstreets.org.uk/press-media/government-failing-to-meet-walk-to-school-target/

2 https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/national-travel-survey-2024/nts-2024-travel-to-and-from-school

3 https://www.london.gov.uk/who-we-are/what-london-assembly-does/questions-mayor/find-an-answer/car-journeys-during-school-drop-offs

4 https://www.theguardian.com/education/2025/jan/14/private-school-run-in-south-london-linked-to-27-per-cent-rise-in-air-pollution

5 https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2025/jul/02/england-regional-mayors-back-plan-national-active-travel-network?CMP=Share_AndroidApp_Other

6 https://hansard.parliament.uk/commons/2025-04-22/debates/97145CA1-ED45-4751-8EF4-6FD128715076/RoadSafetyAndActiveTravelToSchool

7 https://www.schoolguide.co.uk/blog/location-is-number-1-factor-for-choosing-a-school

8 https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/national-travel-survey-2024/nts-2024-travel-to-and-from-school