Mediating mobility at the school gate: interpreting London's School Street schemes

Following the Covid-19 pandemic, local authorities in London introduced numerous daily time-limited closures to streets in front of schools, known as ‘School Streets’. Nearly a third of the city’s primary schools now have School Streets, with their rapid implementation as emergency measures marking an acceleration of state-led ‘tactical urbanism’ in London. However, despite a stated motivation for School Streets being to increase active travel to school, evidence for their effectiveness in changing travel behaviour lags their widespread adoption.

Responding to this gap, the research has two primary aims. First, to understand the contribution of School Streets to children’s mobility in London, asking if and how a small street-level intervention might lead to wider behavioural changes – a growing policy approach with inconsistent evidence in the academic literature. Second, it seeks to investigate the dynamics of this novel ‘tactical’ mode of policy implementation, assessing whether the rapidity of this change has led to fair outcomes. The dissertation draws on qualitative and quantitative research methods; with practitioner interviews complemented by datasets on the spatial distribution of these schemes and school travel surveys.

The research finds that although practitioners disagree on the mechanism of change, School Streets are associated with increased active travel to school and decreases in private motor vehicle use. However, although policymakers have rapidly introduced a widespread programme of schemes, almost all of which remain in place, equity issues remain, with little evidence of prioritisation of schools facing the worst air pollution at the city-scale. For practitioners, these findings provide evidence that School Streets can change travel behaviour but highlight a need for greater attention to the fairness of outcomes. This research also contributes to emerging literature investigating travel behaviour through the study of interventions, and to debates on the use of ‘tactical urbanism’ by city governments.