• AA5B@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      It’s always money.

      When I first moved to the town I live in now, I was impressed by the all new schools. However I eventually realized they replaced a bunch of older neighborhood schools with a smaller number of bigger schools. They saved money by providing a worse educational experience and making walking less likely.

      We walked to my kids elementary school but the town saved money by not plowing the sidewalks in winter, nor forcing residents to. Our walk would require walking on a major street - until my ex went full Karen and made them plow

      When my kids got to middle school, we were in “walking” distance so there was no bus. However that was a full mile including crossing a six lane road whose light was always broken, and they didn’t spring for a crossing guard . We ended up choosing a private school in a different town, so there were no buses nor walkability

      Regional school districts are now common. More kids goto schools that are not even in their towns

    • baggachipz@sh.itjust.works
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      6 months ago

      If only there were free public transport provided to every student outside a small radius of the school. That would make things so much simpler!

      Seriously, I can’t wrap my head around this. Back in my day, pickup lines simply didn’t exist. You walked or you took the bus.

    • TheJesusaurus@piefed.ca
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      6 months ago

      How do you envision kids being picked up after school? Free for all?

      Edit: yes I’m doubling down, the people in the replies are idiots.

      Obviously walking, biking, or taking the bus is better. Let’s assume that covers 95% of children 95% of the time.

      Now what?

      I was asking what to do WITH CARS that are picking up kids REGARDLESS OF THE FACT THAT ANOTHER KID MIGHT TKAE THE BUS

      • copd@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Just commenting to support and remind you upvote/downvote counts are not representative of correctness.

        I’m british and although it’s easy easy to believe we all walk and get thr bus, the TRUTH is 6% of our schoolchildren have fully complete end to end transport paid by the state (yes taxis) - this is usually due to negligence of the parents.

        There is a real requirement for kids to be picked up by cars and removing that option will only hurt the education of the innocent child.

        People on this site are very quick to binary extremism and would immediately struggle if given power of choice over others in real world scenarios.

        • tyler@programming.dev
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          6 months ago

          I think the point others are making is that 6% is essentially nothing. In America it’s 39%. That is just percentage using cars to go to school. Not using public funds at all. https://www.bts.gov/browse-statistical-products-and-data/info-gallery/modes-transportation-available-and-used-students

          So now imagine 33% (car dropoff from that statistic, vs driving yourself) of your students’ parents sitting in a car line outside the school. In a school with 512 students (USA average) that is 169 cars waiting in line. In Britain, with the same school size, that would be 30 cars in line…if a line existed at all, because it looks like in Britain 9 of 10 children using the HTST program actually share the taxi so it’s only ~12 cars in line.

          With these numbers you wouldn’t even notice a line, which is why many people in this thread are talking about it like it’s crazy. It’s not that nobody uses cars in other countries, it’s that it’s so insane the number of cars us Americans use.

          Notably, those numbers for America don’t actually describe the full picture. If you dig down into that spreadsheet you actually see that 20% of American schools report that over 50% of students are dropped off by car each day. The survey doesn’t go any higher than that, so the actual percentage of students dropped off by car each day actually might be much much much higher than 33%. So in a full quarter of the US we have more than half the school being dropped off and picked up by car each day, and we don’t even know how high that percentage goes! Finally, 69% of schools reported that their students do not have access to public transit, so it’s not even possible to get to a state like Europe has. We do have school buses, but that’s essentially the same thing as your taxis, except even worse cause we’re paying for them for almost 90% of schools! So not only are at least 33% of students getting dropped off by car at school, but we’re still paying for private school buses for those students, even if they’re not used or needed.

          So in summary: 6% is really nothing. American’s pay for 90% for school buses alone. 33% of students are still dropped off by car, even though school buses might be available. Finally, 69% of schools don’t even have access to public transit.

          The statistics around walking/biking infrastructure is even more telling. 22% of schools don’t even have sidewalks to walk to the school. 59% don’t have crossing guards. 65% don’t have speed bumps or tables. 80% don’t have bike lanes.

  • Agent641@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Ohh, school pick up lines as in, a line of cars picking up students. Not pick-up lines, like “Hey baby, can you show me where music class is, cause I feel like playing in A minor.”