Parents will be blocked from picking up their children outside the gates of a Newcastle school, after long-delayed plans to boost walking and cycling were finally confirmed.
City transport chiefs have announced that streets around Hotspur Primary School, in Heaton, will be shut at pick-up and drop-off times in a bid to make the area safer for youngsters. The ‘School Streets’ scheme will begin on June 13 and run for an initial 18 months, having initially been slated to start 12 months earlier.
11 schools across the city were due to be taking part in the trials, which have been repeatedly delayed since first being announced by Newcastle City Council in March 2021. The authority confirmed that it does still intend to impose traffic bans outside schools other than Hotspur and said details will emerge “in due course”.
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Mowbray Street, Hotspur Street and Newington Road, as well as the back lanes behind Stratford Road and between Hotspur Street and Warwick Street and Hotspur Street and Mowbray Street will all be affected by the closures, which will be enforced from 8am to 9.30am between 2.30pm and 4pm on school days.
It means that a pedestrian and cycling zone will be created around the school, which it is hoped will encourage more families to walk, scoot or cycle. Access will be permitted, however, for vehicles belonging to local residents, school staff, emergency services and blue badge holders.
Ali Stansfield, School Streets officer for charity Sustrans, said: “The pupils at Hotspur Primary School are really keen to travel actively but they have told us that they’re worried about dangerous driving and parking near their school. A School Street at Hotspur will allow these pupils and their families to have safer, healthier and more fun journeys to and from school.”
The lengthy delays to the pollution-cutting proposals have been a source of frustration, with the council having only held a handful of one-day trials of School Streets until now. Earlier this year, one parent at Hotspur Primary demanded action to put an end to the “crush of cars” outside his son’s school.
Kevin McVittie, head teacher at Hotspur Primary School, said: “The roads around Hotspur Primary School can become very congested at the beginning and end of the day so we really welcome the introduction of the School Streets scheme as it means it will be much safer for our children and much better for local residents. The scheme also builds on the messages about healthy living that we give to children in school by further encouraging walking, cycling or scooting to school.”
Under an experimental traffic order being used for the road closures, the public will be invited to give feedback during the first six months of the trial. The other primary schools included in the initial list of 11 earmarked for School Streets were Ravenswood, Chillingham Road, Grange Park, Kingston Park, Dame Allan’s, Sacred Heart, Broadwood, Lemington Riverside, Farne and Westgate Hill.
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