Daily school drop-off routines have become an assembly-line process of cars queuing, idling, and unloading children while staff manage vehicle flow. Rates of walking and biking to school plummeted from nearly half of children in 1969 to around 11% today, with sharp declines even for those living within a mile. Contributing factors include moving schools to peripheral, cheap land with parking lots, road engineering that prioritizes long-distance automobile throughput over short pedestrian trips, and parental perceptions of danger despite higher child fatality risk as vehicle passengers. The result is increased child dependency and reduced independent active travel.
A line of SUVs and minivans snakes around the school. Engines idle as mothers and fathers inch forward, phones in one hand, coffee in the other. Kids sit in the back seat scrolling on their own phones, waiting for their turn to be unloaded by a staff member in a reflective vest. One by one, the doors open, backpacks are lifted, and the vehicle pulls away.
In 1969, about 48% of children walked or biked to school. By 2009, that number had dropped to just 13%, according to Walk, Bike & Roll to School statistics. Today, the figure hovers around 11%, largely unchanged for a decade, per Rutgers University. Even among children who live within a mile of school, walking or biking has fallen from nearly 90% in 1969 to just 35% in 2009.
The shift didn't happen because children stopped being born with legs or because they stopped wanting independence. Schools were moved to the edges of town, often on cheap land surrounded by parking lots and wide arterial roads. Roads were engineered to maximize long-distance automobile throughput and minimize short-distance walking and cycling. Parents were persuaded that it was unsafe to let kids walk or bike, even though most child fatalities happen while they are passengers in vehicles.
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