Get on your bike for Cycle to School Week!

Cycling is great for fitness and wellbeing - and green.

Organised by the Bikeability Trust in partnership with cycling charity Sustrans, this year’s national campaign is asking pupils, parents and teachers to make one of four cycling pledges on Bikeability’s website

The four pledges to choose from are:

1. Swap one car journey for cycling
2. Cycle to school everyday
3. Discover somewhere new on your cycle, or
4. Go on a cycle ride with family.

Those making a pledge on the website also get entered into the Bikability prize draw to win a brand new Frog children’s bike.

Bike touring organisation Cycling UK says a little over 2% of UK children cycle to school while over a third (35.4%) are driven - despite the average journey to school being 2.4 miles.

And Bikeability, who run cycle training for schools, calculate that if just one child pedalled to school instead of travelling in the car for a year, it would cut congestion and save almost half a tonne in carbon dioxide emissions: That’s equivalent to growing eight trees for a decade, or charging over 58,000 mobile phones.

Children, including in Years 5 and 6 are ready to cycle to school by themselves, or with friends, once they’ve completed their Bikeability Level 2. Level 2 teaches skills needed to cycle confidently and safely on the road.

Kent County Council Cabinet Member for Adult Social Care and Public Health, Dan Watkins, said: “Cycle to School Week is fantastic opportunity to inspire children to learn how to ride a bike and for families to switch four wheels for two for the school run.

Cycling is fun and makes you fitter, healthier and happier. It also boosts confidence and concentration, which helps hugely with learning.

For all these reasons KCC, together with Active Travel England, is working hard to encourage and enable more journeys in and through Kent to be made by walking, cycling and wheeling.

Kent has at least 1,421km of on and off-road cycle paths and families can download the free Kent Connected app on their phones to discover cycling routes near them.”

KCC is helping improve opportunities for children to cycle through a range of initiatives, including by:

• supporting schools with access to Bikeability’s national standard cycle training - so young people from primary through to secondary learn how to ride a bike safely.
• working with schools that want to go that step further to develop a School Travel Plan - identifying ways to help staff and pupils to cycle and use active travel methods. This could include installing cycle and scooter storage, welly sheds and shower facilities
• funding Kent Road Safety videos - about the best way to get kids excited about cycling as a life skill and bike maintenance, and
• encouraging school leaders to encourage pupils and parents to swap one car journey for a cycle journey.

KCC Cabinet Member for Highways and Transport, Neil Baker, said: “Learning to cycle has so many benefits for youngsters and ensuring they are able to do this safely on Kent’s roads is essential.

That is why we invest in making sure we support the schools that want to promote walking and cycling as a means to get to and from school - helping to build School Travel Plans, providing educational material tailored to the age of the children and making information available on the best route to take.”

Visit the Explore Kent website for information and inspiration about active travel, including cycling, in Kent

As well as cycling routes, the free Kent Connected app has lots of walking routes to help families get out and about in Kent.

This Media toolkit contains useful information about how schools can get involved in Cycle to School Week.

The Bikeability website contains lots of resources and information for schools. There’s also lots of handy guides about how to support the dedicated week-long campaign.