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School Travel Plans

Every school should have a School Travel Plan (STP). An STP is a document that:

  • Summarises current travel patterns and traffic problems
  • Sets targets
  • Identifies solutions
  • Addresses all aspects of the journey to school and encourages
  • Walking
  • Cycling
  • Use of public transport
  • Better management of remaining school run vehicles

The plan should be available to parents and pupils on the school website, via the school induction packs, and form a part of the school policies and procedures. 

How to create an STP

There is no right or wrong way to write an STP. Each plan will be tailored to each school's individual set of circumstances. Our guidance is designed to be used by schools and parent councils to help with the development of these plans. It contains information on what should be included, why every school should have one and where to begin.

The following questions should be considered when writing the plan:

  1. Who is it you hope will pick up and read this plan? For example pupils, parents, local council officers in relation to funding, local councillors.
  2. Will they understand what a school travel plan is and what information will be relevant to them?
  3. Why are you writing this plan, and what are the key messages you want to get across? This information needs to be clearly stated in the plan above everything else.
  4. Who will be in charge or reviewing the plan and can the aims you set be measurable?

View the School Travel Plan guide (PDF 5.19MB).

Consultation

It is important to consult with school user groups when developing an STP. A good way to do this is by conducting surveys. Surveys are a useful tool to gather information and allow school users to feed their opinions into the travel plan. These will help form up what the problems are and then what actions need to be driven forward. 

These surveys are available as online surveys and can be provided on request. Maps are also available as an online tool to allow people to pin point where they may have concerns on their journeys to school, or as paper version, contact the Strategy Team for support with these.   

View example questionnaires:

Example template

Feel free to use the template below to help you get started. Please note that this is only intended as a guideline. You may wish to add or remove certain sections to suit your school. Many schools prefer to create a child friendly travel plan. It has been proven this type of design will more likely be picked up and read not only by pupils, but parents as well.

View School Travel Plan example template (PDF 23.8KB).

Links to Curriculum for Excellence

All the work associated with school travel planning has been designed to fit into the Curriculum for Excellence (CFE). View the CFE outcome for clear information on how this works. 

Education resources

The council, with support from their schools have designed a resource pack (PDF 2.5MB) on the themes of safe, active and sustainable transport. This provides an in depth and clear guide how to incorporate active and sustainable travel messages into lessons. Lessons are grouped under themes, age groups and show links to the curriculum. View our lesson plans.

Contact

You can contact us by emailing transportationstrategy@aberdeenshire.gov.uk or by calling us on 01467 536929. For School Transport related questions please email school.transport@aberdeenshire.gov.uk or call 01467 533335.