Walking Routes to Schools

Guidelines for the Assessment of the Safety of Walking Routes to School

Introduction

Duty of Local Authority to Provide Transport

Cheshire East Council’s home to school transport policy has been drawn up on the basis of Sections 39 and 55 of the Education Act (1944), Section 53 of the Education Act (1986) and Section 199(4) of the Education Act (1993) which have been amended by Section 509 and 444 of the Education Act (1996).

Local authorities are required “to make such arrangements as they consider necessary and any such transport provided in pursuance of such arrangements shall be provided free of charge.”

It is a duty of parents to secure the regular attendance at school of registered pupils but they have a defence against any action for failure to secure attendance if they can prove that a pupil is not within walking distance of school and that the local authority has not provided transport.

Walking distance is defined as up to two miles in the case of a child under eight and three miles for any older child.

The case of Rogers v. Essex County Council (1986) was one of the most significant cases brought in recent years on the issue of an available walking route. At appeal, the Law Lords ruled that the route was available if the child, “accompanied as necessary”, could walk the route in reasonable safety. Following this judgment, Section 53 of the 1986 Bill was enacted to amend Section 55 of the 1944 Act as follows:

“In considering whether or not they are required ... to make arrangements in relation to a particular pupil, the local education authority shall have regard (amongst other things) to the age of the pupil and the nature of the route, or alternative routes, which he could reasonably be expected to take”.

This issue is now covered by the 1996 Education Act.

Guidelines for the Assessment of the Safety of Walking Routes

In view of the statutes and case law described above, it is necessary for officers to make assessments of the safety of those routes whose lengths fall below those defined as reasonable walking distance. To assist local authorities in these assessments, guidelines were prepared in 2002 by a working group of the Local Authority Road Safety Officers’ Association (LARSOA) entitled Guidelines: Identification of hazards and the assessment of risk of walked routes to school.

These guidelines have been adopted by the Council and most other local authorities. The information given below is abstracted from the LARSOA document which is expected to be made available in the near future.

It should be noted that the guidelines are intended to assist authorities in determining the relative safety of an available route from a road safety perspective and not from one of “personal security” on the journey.

Route Assessment Procedure

In assessing the safety of an “available route”, consideration is given only to the potential risk created by traffic, highway and topographical conditions, not personal safety.
Each case must be considered objectively on its merits.
It is assumed that the child is accompanied as necessary by a responsible parent or carer.
Where there is a footway or roadside strip of reasonable width and condition, public footpath or bridleway, this will normally be assumed to provide an available route for that part of the journey.
Where a verge exists, on a lightly trafficked or narrow road, which can be stepped on to by the child and accompanying person when vehicles are passing, it can normally be assumed to provide an available route for that part of the journey. This is what is referred to in these guidelines as a “step-off”.
These guidelines assume that the walker will cross the road to utilise the footway or roadside strip.
Many available routes may lie along roads that have neither footway nor verge. On such roads, consideration must be given to the width of the carriageway, traffic speed and composition (such as frequent long/heavy goods vehicles) and to visibility (i.e. sharp bends with high hedgerows or other obstructions to visibility).
Where road crossings are necessary, the availability of any facility (e.g. central refuges, pedestrian crossings, traffic signals etc) to assist such crossing should be taken into consideration. Where no crossing facilities exist an assessment of the risks which may be generated by crossing the road (bearing in mind the traffic speed and flows, sight lines etc) should be made. A separate assessment is required for each crossing point.
A plan showing the length of route should be attached to each assessment.

Route Assessment Summary

For a route to be classified as Non-Hazardous there needs to be:-

Both

a continuous adequate footway on roads which carry normal to heavy traffic
Or step-offs on roads which are lightly trafficked but have adequate sight lines to provide sufficient advance warning.
Or on roads with a low traffic flow, no step-offs, but sufficiently good sight lines to provide adequate advance warning.

And

If there is a need to cross roads there must be:-

Crossing facilities (Zebra or Pelican crossings)
Pedestrian phases at traffic signals (including necessary refuges)
School Crossing Patrols
Traffic calming (sufficient to enable safe road crossing)
Pedestrian refuges
Or sufficient gaps in the traffic flow and sight lines to allow enough opportunities to cross safely.

If a crossing manoeuvre is required on the route, the available visibility at the location should allow for a vehicle to stop within the stopping distances given in the Highway Code for the speed below which 85% of vehicles are travelling in free flow traffic conditions.

Road Crossing Assessment

The difficulty of crossing at a site can be assessed by considering the number of gaps in the traffic flow which are acceptable to pedestrians.

Most pedestrians will accept a gap of 4-6 seconds at normal urban vehicle speeds to cross two lanes of traffic and even shorter gaps at slow vehicle approach speeds. Other groups may require somewhat larger gaps, of around 10 to 12 seconds or even longer.

Site Surveys

A minimum of three one-hour site surveys must be conducted, the data being recorded in 5-minute consecutive periods. The minimum should involve a one hour survey in the morning immediately before the start of the school day and another immediately after the end of the school day. A further survey should be conducted during the busiest period, which may be either in the morning or afternoon.

A survey should be carried out to record the number of gaps, in each 5-minute period, which are greater than the road crossing time (using 3 feet per second as the walking speed). Four gaps in each 5-minute period indicate a road, which it can be considered reasonable to cross without undue delay. It may also be necessary to analyse the gap lengths. (Transport Note 1/95, which deals with the assessment of sites for proposed pedestrian facilities, contains further information about methods which might be used to determine gaps.)

Traffic Counts

Where the two-way traffic flow [one way on dual carriageways] is below the equivalent of 240 passenger cars per hour, the road is assessed as safe to cross.

Summary

For a route to be considered “available” it must be a route along which a child, accompanied as necessary, can walk with reasonable safety to school.

If there is a footway of adequate width, ie at least 1 metre wide, and in reasonable condition, suitable for walking on, clear of overhanging shrubs or trees throughout the whole length of the journey, and there is no need to cross the road, then the route is deemed to be safe. Informed judgement by the professional may still be necessary, dependent upon traffic flows and the nature of the route.

When there is a need to cross the road, in order to use the opposite footway, or to improve sight lines, it may be necessary to identify and provide advice about the safest crossing places.

On some country lanes the footway may not be continuous. In such cases, informed judgement will need to be made about the availability and sufficiency of step-off points (facilities for pedestrians to be able easily to step off clear of the roadway onto a reasonable even and firm surface).

The presence or absence of street lighting on a route is not considered to be a factor.

The assessor will need to be aware of the accident record for the route in question.