School Travel Plans

A school travel plan is a document that sets out the long-term strategy for:

• reducing car use on the journey to school;
• enabling and encouraging pupils to walk, cycle or use public transport; and
• making the journey safer, healthier and more pleasant for the whole school community.

A school travel plan can apply to a single school or a group of schools close to each other. A school might develop a plan as a result of entering our Safer Routes to School Challenge, as a requirement of a planning condition, or simply because a school is concerned about its pupils' health and safety on the journey to school. Maintained schools are now also eligible to apply for an additional grant from the government when they produce an effective school travel plan. This is a one-off capital payment available until March 2008.

Help in developing a school travel plan

While each school travel plan will differ according to local circumstances, there are key elements that need to be included. These are highlighted in an 'outline school travel plan' that you can download either as a Word document or as a 'pdf' file from the links at the bottom of this page. You will also find guidelines in the sustainable schools area of the teachernet website www.teachernet.gov.uk.

As a starting point, the school needs to identify a person who will be responsible for developing the plan and taking the lead - the school champion. This can be the head teacher, a governor, a member of the parent teacher association, a member of a residents association or a parent.

The school champion should then contact our School Travel Plan Co-ordinator who will offer dedicated advice and support in developing a plan. E-mail transportation@stoke.gov.uk or telephone 01782 234968.

You can view 'pdf' files with Adobe Acrobat Reader, download a free copy of Adobe Acrobat Reader here.

If you are using access technology you can follow this link to use Access Adobe to convert this file into html.