The Journey to and from School
Every school day thousands of Maltese and Gozitan children travel from home to school in the morning and back from school to home in the afternoon. The few children who are lucky to live close to school walk there; but a larger proportion who live further away travel mainly by bus or by car.
Each morning, buses and cars carrying schoolchildren create localised congestion around schools and contribute to peak hour road traffic, all of which increases air pollution. For these reasons, other ways of travelling, such as walking and cycling to and from school must be encouraged, both for the benefit of our children’s health and the environment.
Walking to school is one of the healthier options, especially for students who live a relatively short distance from school. Walking to school is a practical way for students to include more physical activity in their everyday routine. Apart from improving their physical fitness and contributing to their mental health, by walking to school they will also be discovering more about the area they live in, they will be saving money (no transport costs) and they will be protecting the environment (by not contributing to emissions). Read more
A number of children travel to and from school using school transport, which in Malta and Gozo are either coaches or mini-vans. This service offers a number of advantages, especially to those students who live some distance away from school or in areas which are off the normal public bus routes. School transport may be at a charge. Unfortunately, nowadays, very few children go to school using public transport. Read more
In Malta and Gozo, the alternatives for travelling to school are diverse. Apart from walking, taking the school transport or using public buses, one could possibly cycle there or be part of a car pooling system.
A number of children are driven to and from school by parents. This is not a sustainable option. Using rollerblades or skateboards would be a sustainable option, but is probably quite impractical and dangerous in most areas in Malta or Gozo as the infrastructure does not exist for these active transportation means. Read more
