Kathleen Wilker
Making walking to school kid-friendly.
Day two of the Kickstand Sessions in Ottawa started with Angela van der Kloof of the Dutch sustainable transportation consulting firm, Mobycon, arriving at my house to join six-year-old Jasper and me on our walk to school. I invited Angela to join us after hearing how many kids in the Netherlands bike to school.
In our neighbourhood, there are lots of kids who walk with and without parents, but fewer who bike. Many families live within 1.5 kilometres of the school, so walking doesn't take very long. And lots of kids get picked up at the end of the day from an off site after school program, so having kid's bikes parked at the school can be akward. But I also find that biking to school is tricky because of parents parking close to the school and opening their car doors. So I was hoping Angela might have some ideas on how to make biking to school more inviting.
My daughter is 9 and walks to school with her friends. Every morning there's a delightful gaggle of girls who arrive at our back door and whisk her away. It's very sweet to see them scampering down the street together. By the time they reach the school, there are often as many as 13 kids walking along together. Now that there's a crossing guard at a four way stop close to the school where a lot of drivers weren't stopping or watching for children, many parents feel comfortable having the kids walk to school in a group.
We had a lovely walk to school. Jasper biked on ahead and stopped at the intersections and waited for us to catch up. Angela commented on how wide our Canadian roads were and how light the traffic was.
After dropping Jasper off, we walked over to the Kickstand Sessions which began with Angela presenting on Bike Parking, Bike Sharing and Cycling Education. Most of the discussions I've heard around cycling education focus on how to teach kids to bike safely within the context of school. Angela talked about cycling education being a beautiful part of the parent-child relationship and a special and significant way to relate to your children. "When I add up the amount of time I've spent biking with my kids and teaching them how to ride, it's easily over 1000 hours," she said.
These words brought tears to my eyes. Because really, that's what it's always been about for me. I love being close to my kids. When they were little I loved carrying them. And biking--with front seats, back seats, trail-a-bikes, long tails and tandems--is a natural extension of carrying your kids. When we walk together, it's lovely to hold hands. Biking side by side when we're out on the bike path together is a natural extension of moving through the world, connected. Now that they're bigger, they love biking ahead and then having me catch up. It's the push and pull of exploring the wide world and coming back home.
