Four more School Streets for Bristol
Streets outside of four more schools in Bristol will have additional protections for children and families at school pickup and drop off whilst encouraging more active forms of travel on the daily school run.
The four schools join seven others to bring the total number of official School Streets in our city to 11, with plans for further schemes in the pipeline.
The four schools which have introduced new measures during the autumn term are:
- Ashley Down Primary School in Horfield
- Cathedral Primary School and Bristol Cathedral Choir School in Hotwells
- Fair Furlong Primary School in Hartcliffe
- St Bernadette Catholic Primary School in Whitchurch
The streets outside these schools are now classed as walking, cycling, and wheeling zones, restricting car use with temporary barriers across the road at drop off and pick up times at the start and end of the school day.
The permanent schemes encourage families to walk, cycle, wheel, scoot or park further away from the school and walk the last part of the journey.
I am delighted to welcome four more Bristol schools to our growing School Streets programme. All these schools will benefit from reduced traffic outside their gates, improved road safety for pupils, reduced air pollution, and more children travelling actively to school.
Councillor Don Alexander, Cabinet Member for Transport
It’s encouraging to see the number of local schools now benefitting from a School Street steadily increasing. Early in 2024 we will start the process of introducing another four more School Streets across the city. I hope further schools will work with us to establish them for the benefit of their school communities.
Thank you to the team for making our School Street such a positive experience. The pedestrian access around the school site has been much safer with less congestion on the narrow pavements.
Amy Sood, Headteacher of Ashley Down Primary School
Thank you to our families for embracing active travel to school and if having to use a car, parking safely further away, and then walking.
Drivers along Downend Road have been much more cautious and have definitely been slowing down when they see the road closure. The community response to the School Street has been overwhelmingly positive and we thank the volunteers who are enabling this to continue.
What has been so amazing about the launch of our new School Street has been the collaboration to make this work. There has been collaboration between the school staff, the PCSOs, the parking enforcement team, the active travel and School Streets team – and the parents. Parental support for the scheme has been overwhelmingly positive.
Barbara Lee, Headteacher of St Bernadette Catholic Primary School
We at Fair Furlong Primary are very excited to be working with Bristol School Streets to help make our pupils’ journeys to and from school a safer and healthier experience. As a school community we have witnessed many near misses on our roads and pavements, and we wished to take action before a serious incident happened involving one of our children. We aim to limit road usage around the school site and create safer pavements, enabling our children and their families to freely walk, scoot or cycle in safety.
Sarah Andrews, Headteacher of Fair Furlong Primary School
We are so pleased to have successfully implemented a School Streets scheme this term, with significant support from the Active Travel team at Bristol City Council.
Sara Yarnold, Headteacher of Cathedral Primary School, and Jo Thurston, Headteacher of Bristol Cathedral Choir School
We initially enquired about the scheme with the hope of reducing traffic coming into the school area at drop-off and pick-up times. With the unique positioning of our school buildings and the intersecting road we felt that closing the road to traffic would significantly reduce the risk to pedestrians and cyclists.
We’re pleased to confirm that the scheme has had a big impact through reduced traffic onto the Square, and has done exactly as planned, which is to make our school environment a safer place for families and staff.
