Switching off your car engine while stationary is one simple way of reducing emissions

School is no place for idling. Dropping and picking up your kids right outside the building with your engine still running is bad for all sorts of reasons.
Idling makes for worse air quality. This happens where cars and buses loiter to pick up children. Every ten seconds that a car is idling produces more emissions than restarting the engine.
Unfortunately it’s young people who are at the greatest risk from the air pollution outside their schools because their lungs are still developing, according to An Taisce’s No Idling toolkit for schools. Children are shorter than adults too, so they are physically closer to car exhaust pipes.
There’s climate change to think about too. When an engine is running, it emits carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas responsible for climate change. By switching off your engine when stopped, you stop these emissions too.
Then there’s the safety aspect – when cars and buses are idling outside a school, it is harder for students to hear cars that are actually moving, and which might not be visible behind idling cars.
While electric cars don’t idle, and many modern cars have a feature that switches off the engine when the car isn’t moving, there are still many vehicles that are guilty of needless idling outside our schools.
Idling wastes fuel, too, and that’s wasting your money.
Last year, St Joseph’s Primary School in Ballinrobe, Co Mayo took steps to reduce idling. It trialed closing two car set-down areas to the front of the building.
The school has 450 students and about 50 staff attending daily. It’s located close to a 700-pupil secondary school too, which has more than 80 staff attending.
Congestion at the front of St Joseph’s at start and finish times, especially on Fridays when the secondary school finishes earlier, were a challenge for those walking, cycling or scooting to school.
The set-down areas meant cars and buses were in conflict with those coming and going on foot and on wheels. Turning movements into and out of the set-down areas contributed to congestion.
The school worked with the Department of Transport’s Safe Roads to School scheme and Mayo County Council to trial the closure of both set-down areas. No vehicles were to use it, except for schoolbuses accessing a parking area.
Parents and students were given plenty of information about the closure in advance.
It’s all very well closing the set-down area, but those needing to get primary-aged children to school before perhaps dropping a younger sibling to preschool and then rushing to work need an alternative. So before the trial set-down closure, the school established two walking buses, one leaving from Supermacs, 650m from the school, and another from Dunleavy’s shop 300m away.
The trial closure of the set-down area was successful and created a calmer, quieter and more enjoyable space for all, according to a Safe Routes to School analysis. The number of children walking to school increased too.
When students arrived at school by car, drop-offs were generally done safely, but a small number of dangerous manoeuvres were observed, the analysis showed.
The school plans to continue to run trial closures and the Safe Routes to School delivery plan includes linking up with a Ballinrobe urban greenway providing a route connecting the school to a “park and stride” location at Tesco some 750m away but which will be closer via the greenway.
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Switching off your car engine while stationary is one simple and effective way of reducing our emissions, while also making the air outside your children’s school cleaner. Walking, cycling and carpooling when you can will help too. Maybe we can all give it a go after the midterm break.