Conor, Julie and Green Team members, Leon, Daniel and Jamie welcomed Dublin's Lord Mayor, Hazel Chu, to Francis Street to launch a School Safe Zone in collaboration with DCC, the NTA and Green Schools Ireland.
What is a School Safe Zone? Read below...
Dublin City Council, in collaboration with the NTA and Green-Schools, have implemented a new School Zone at Francis Street CBS, John Dillon Street, Dublin 8.
School Zones are designed to encourage vehicles to slow down, discourage drop off and pick up to reduce congestion and increase safety at the school gate.
Speaking about the School Zone initiative, the Lord Mayor of Dublin, Hazel Chu, said this new introduction will allow children travel safely to school.
“I am delighted Dublin City Council are implementing measures such as school zones. High volumes of vehicles at school gates mean small children have no safe access to school, often having to manoeuvre around parked and turning vehicles to get into the school grounds.”
Recently 200 school principals responded to a national survey, identifying vehicle parking and vehicle drop off congestion as the number one challenge for social distancing at the front of their school.
Brendan O’Brien, Head of Transportation Technical Services in Dublin City Council says it is important to encourage parents to walk or cycle with their kids to school.
“We need to make the school gate a safe zone and encourage parents and children to walk or cycle and keep the areas around schools clear for pupils. We understand that some parents will need to use their cars to drop their children to school but we would ask them to make the drop off point away from the school and walk from there instead of blocking the school gates.
Hugh Creegan, Director of Infrastructure and Deputy CEO National Transport Authority said depending on how successful this first ‘School Zone’ is, they could introduce across the county.
“We are delighted that Dublin City Council are trialling some “School Zone” Designs. The NTA developed this initiative in collaboration with Green-Schools Travel to address repeated calls from schools and pupils for safer, less vehicle dominated, front of school environments. These ‘School Zone’ designs are not going to be suitable everywhere, but if these trials are deemed successful there is potential for other Local Authorities to extend the ‘School Zone’ template to other schools.”