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news
Sandringham School (via StreetView).jpgAcademy school makes cycle helmets compulsory and says it will suspend pupils who ride on the pavement
Sandringham School in St Albans says it will suspend children if they’re caught riding to school on the pavement. It has also said that no child will be allowed to cycle to school without a helmet and promised that regular checks will be carried out to enforce the rule.
Current government guidance is that cyclists may ride on the footway, provided they do so considerately.
However, a letter to parents from headteacher Alan Gray states that cycling on pavements has been made a C5 offence – the same rating assigned to racially abusing another pupil.
Concerned father David Stacy tweeted the letter and has since written to the school to object.
Really disappointed with this @SandringhamSch1 - will lead to a) fewer children cycling b) reduced child safety c) more traffic congestion and d) worse pollution. Children should be taught to cycle safely and with care for pedestrians. School could be more robust with complaints pic.twitter.com/uk0cr3vLml
— David Stacey (@staceyzoo) November 9, 2017
Cycling UK Head of Campaigns, Duncan Dollimore said: “In March, this Academy published a School Travel Plan which acknowledged there was significant interest from both children and their parents in students cycling to school, that the school wanted to encourage this and should look at incentives to do so. The same document also referred to parents and residents parking on the road outside the school, blocking the cycling lanes, but that the school was wholly reliant on their goodwill to comply with parking restrictions.
“It really was not difficult. The school could have liaised with the local authority about parking restrictions and enforcement, so that children cycling to school didn’t have to negotiate parked cars on both sides of the road with both oncoming and following traffic in a narrowed lane, as described by parent David Stacy.
“Of course, that might have upset the grown-ups, so instead of applying his efforts to make it easier and safer for children to cycle to school, the headteacher has threatened to ban children from cycling to school, which he can’t do, make helmet wearing mandatory, when that is a matter of parental choice, and impose disciplinary sanctions for pupil’s actions outside of school.”
Surrey school says students can only cycle to school if they fit a number plate to their bikes
Stacy told The Hertfordshire Advertiser that teenagers should be taught to be respectful to walkers, getting off or slowing down when passing.
“A cyclist-motor vehicle conflict is significantly riskier than a cyclist-pedestrian one. And now, with fewer children cycling, there will be even more traffic on the road dealing with the resultant extra car journeys.
“Fewer, more dangerous cycling trips; more traffic; more pollution. This does not strike me as being a decision in the best interests of the health and wellbeing of the school’s pupils.”
Gray said: “The welfare of our students is of paramount importance to us and by enforcing these rules more robustly, we are ensuring that all of our students who cycle to and from school do so in a way that is both safe for them and for other travellers.”
Cycling UK is unimpressed. Dollimore said: “Rather than trying to tackle the problem outside his school gates he has implemented measures which are likely to lead children to decide that cycling to school is just too much hassle, because teachers will be checking what they are doing every day at the school gates.
“But at least he will look decisive in the eyes of the local residents, for whom an un-helmeted kid cycling on a footpath is a greater safety concern than the traffic congestion and chaos at school drop-off and collection time.
“Teenage girls who cycle to school are seven times more likely to meet the Government’s recommended levels of physical activity than girls who don’t, but helmet compulsion in Sydney Australia led to a 90% reduction in teenage girls cycling. That’s the sort of unintended consequence that this type of ill-thought out policy, placating local residents, can lead to.”
Alex has written for more cricket publications than the rest of the road.cc team combined. Despite the apparent evidence of this picture, he doesn't especially like cake.
Latest Comments
- wycombewheeler 1 min 15 sec ago
I have no trouble at all believing a judge might conclude I was partially to blame by not wearing a helmet, and so colcude contributory negligence...
- mike the bike 2 min 56 sec ago
I well remember the year, 1977 was it, when Perineum Pain won the Derby. I had a tenner on him and took a cab home, the whole fifty miles.
- wycombewheeler 13 min 26 sec ago
but I can't move a fridge between my old and new flat in that e car
- wycombewheeler 14 min 39 sec ago
the risk per km is very similar (which surprised me), and while individual cyclists will cycle a lot further than people walk, there are very many...
- HLaB 19 min 29 sec ago
Was the qualifying question, do you read the Daily Mail?
- quiff 1 hour 30 min ago
I'm not that keen on three abreast on the Embankment superhighway, but on a towpath?!
- KiwiMike 1 hour 50 min ago
True that. But most click-type tools afford a handle big enough to grip with your whole hand centered on the calibration point - or at least three...
- Velophaart_95 2 hours 15 min ago
Each to their own, but its not for me. I understand it in winter in keeping a bit of fitness, bit all year....
- brooksby 2 hours 35 min ago
Or this story from the same website (it's about running, but holds true for cycling IMO):...
Add new comment
65 comments
CycleUseBillionMiles.jpg
Difficult to be sure at that scale but doesn't look like that fits either.
The fall in cost and rise in adoptation of LED lights
So show the data that supports your idea.
I don't think this fits the timeline either.
CostSupplyLED.jpg
So it doesn't fit the timeline at all.
Rise in mobile phone usage and coverage resulting in quicker response from emergency services to incidents in less populated areas.
That's not cycling specific.
You've just failed to interpret the graph correctly.
The pedestrian rate starts falling earlier and approaches parity in the early 90s.
From 1995 onwards the cycling rate starts to fall faster than the pedestrian rate.
So there is clearly a cycling specific factor that becomes significant after 1995.
The pattern fits perfectly with the increasing use of helmets disproving the initial point I was replying to.
This past week a friends husband was in a serious collison with a car, he is alive, without a helmet he would be DEAD!!
Yes we do lots of things that are dangerous like climbing up ladders but I like to minmise my risk when I can.
I not sure how you can know that as a implied fact.
No he wouldn't. Despite the thousands of "helmet saved my life" stories, the death rate of cyclists does not fall as helmet wearing rates increase, and the number of these stories is many times the annual death rate of cyclists. http://www.cyclehelmets.org/1209.html
"Yes we do lots of things that are dangerous like climbing up ladders but I like to minmise my risk when I can. "
So do you wear a helmet up a ladder? Or even walking in the street, which has the same risk per mile travelled as cycling? Or for travelling in a car, which causes many more head injuries than cycling? If not, you aren't minimising risk when you can, only when you assume the risk is much greater than it is, because you've been fooled by the thirty year propaganda campaign for helmets. But you're not alone, most people think that cycling is much riskier than it is, and that helmets are much more effective than they are, because of the outright lies and propaganda.
Oh really?
uk-helmet-wearing-rates-major.gif
Was this proved scientifically with an exact forensic replication of the collision? I think we know the answer to that one, a big fat NO. Facts not speculation.
Make it compulsory for children to wear crash helmets when they travel in cars or are pedestrians going to /from school ?- I think not, there will be a nationwide protest.
Never mind that, make it compulsory for them to be worn on school premises, including for all sport.
Wonder if the school plays full contact rugby/football/hockey?
Another autocratic (probably hypocritical aswell) headteacher telling children to do what isn't even a legal requirement. If my kids went to this school, I would expect him to justify his personal made-up legislation to protect my kids and would then let him know that his sole responsibilty is their education and I call the shots on what they wear when they ride their bikes. If he spent more time and effort on education as opposed to "conditioning" kids they would be sufficiently informed to arrive at their own decisions.
I thought cycling on the pavement was made “legal” and was not enforced by the police any more.
If so, what message is given out by punishing kids for doing a legal thing?
Not exactly legal but within guidelines for certain categories
https://news.npcc.police.uk/releases/support-for-police-discretion-when-...
"Chief police officers, who are responsible for enforcement, acknowledge that many cyclists, particularly children and young people, are afraid to cycle on the road, sensitivity and careful use of police discretion is required."
More recent http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-38688256
I'm sure the Headmaster knows best though and has show a good example of mastering facts and presenting them as a coherent argument.
It has not been made legal, but police have been instructed to use discretion and not enforce it in the case of, for example, children, or when the road is dangerous for cyclists and the cycles are not causing any problem for pedestrians.
Am I the only one who is just grateful that the cockwomble of a head teacher hasn't made number plates a requirement too?
Seriously, what will it teach the children to see that you don't need evidence or data, you just need to impose your will because you're bigger than them.
I wonder what he drives. And what business interests he has outside school.
Don’t you just love how this cockwomble has become an expert in highways and usage cycling and helmet wearing and no doubt high visibility clothing to boot. It infuriates me beyond belief when folk utter such tripe without any evidence to support this.
It it also doesn’t take a rocket scientist to check it’s on the Google’s just enter and all will be revealed. Still as most posters have mentioned he’ll no doubt give himself a huge pat on the back and say what a great wise and wonderful sage he is to implement this crock of shit.
I see they are one of those cockwomble academies that make children wear ties and blazers. How can they expect children to run around, play football and generally be children at break times when they have to wear a suit and tie all day. And they wonder why kids are fat.
Has Andy Gray considered making parking on the road outside the school a C5 offence for disobedience and threatening to ban parents from driving to school. He could maybe issue a letter asking the children to reinforce this with their father/mother.
On the basis the school feels they are in a position to identify pupils who are cycling on pavements, can they not just as easily identify just the students cycling fast or without due care and attention (whether on the pavement or on the road) and offer them further cycle training/education before going down the route of sanctions. This way there is no need to put those pupils cycling with consideration in unnecessary danger by forcing them on to the roads alongside the drivers who are only expected to follow the rules as an act of goodwill.
I'm pissed off enough about the topic at face value.
But a school pushing such dogma is managing to trump that in my blood-pressure stakes.
I'd like to think teachers and governors, of all people, would maybe pause on their way to pulling policy out of their arses, and LOOK AT THE FUCKING EVIDENCE.
Why are the local authorities not doing anything? Oh that's right because they don't give a fuck about safety, pollution and encouraging active travel options.
Laissez faire complicit cunts!
We’ll see more of this as schools are unable to punish parents who, say, park irresponsibly so to be seen to be doing ‘something’ about traffic concerns pick on the kids they have direct control over. A robust group of parents might ask Ofsted if turning law-abiding students away from the school gates - or punishing them in some other ingenious way - is truly an example of ‘best practice’.
I'd prefer it if schools concentrated on educating the pupils. We employ councils and police to deal with traffic issues outside of schools.
Yes indeedy.
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