Scottish schools to be surveyed for travel choices

Sustrans, working in partnership with School Travel Coordinators, is set to embark on the largest and most comprehensive survey of school travel behaviour across Scotland. Between the 8th and 12th September around 700,000 pupils will have the opportunity to take part in the national Hands Up Survey. Each participating school can choose any day that week to complete their own Hands Up Survey.
The survey will be the first of its kind in the UK and will give a nationwide picture of how young people currently travel to and from school. The survey is being carried out in partnership with School Travel Coordinators across 31 local authorities. All participating schools will get the chance to win a visit from a famous stunt bike riding team.
The project will give an in depth view for the first time of how children of different ages, from different schools and different areas of Scotland choose to travel to school. Over the last three years, with £10m of funding, Sustrans has been supporting the development and implementation of projects to increase the number of children walking and cycling to school across Scotland.
This valuable information will be used by Sustrans and School Travel Coordinators to identify where interventions have been successful in encouraging pupils to walk, cycle and use public transport and will highlight those regions and schools that need more support to give children the opportunity to make greener and healthier travel choices.
Philippa Cochrane, Sustrans’ Manager for School Travel in Scotland, said: “I urge all schools to take part in the nationwide ‘Hands Up’ Survey. The information that we will gain from this project will be invaluable in ensuring that Sustrans and School Travel Coordinators in Scotland can continue to effectively tackle the school run by supporting our young people to walk and cycle to school.
“With obesity, climate change and rising oil prices at the top of the agenda it’s crucial that we encourage and enable young people to choose healthy and active ways of travelling to school that also benefit the environment.”
Chris Thompson, Moray Council School Travel Co-ordinator added: “We know anecdotally that a lot of good things are happening around school travel at the moment and pupils, parents and staff are achieving significant changes in travel behaviour. This first national survey of school travel gives us the chance to underline that success with robust data and demonstrate not just the value of the work completed to date but also point us towards future targets with greater certainty.”