Borough’s children smash targets while travelling sustainably to school

Following its launch over a year ago, a project that sees children walk or wheel to school has beaten ambitions set by the government.

The ‘WOW’ project, run by charity Living Streets, sees primary school children self-report how they get to school every day using the interactive WOW Travel Tracker. Badges are awarded to those who travel sustainably at least once a week for a month.

A total of 17 of the borough’s schools now participate in the project, a number which has increased month on month. Since the beginning of the project, over 162,000 active travel journeys have been logged, by over 4,600 pupils. Nationally in England, 9.3 million new walking journeys were logged, removing 1.8 million car km from the roads at peak times.  

With around four in ten children in England living with an unhealthy weight, and more than a quarter of children overweight (including obese), the government set target for 2025 was to hit 55% of children aged 5 to 10 walking or wheeling all the way to school. Starting off this year, schools in Blackburn with Darwen participating in WOW had climbed to 56.75%, exceeding the government target.

Benefits of the programme include reducing school-time traffic, alleviating parking concerns as well as instilling healthy habits in children.

Carolyne Holden, Senior Lead for Curriculum and Maths Lead at St. Luke & St. Philip’s Primary School in Blackburn said:

This is our second year doing the project. The children enjoy taking ownership and inputting their data. The majority of children in every class are achieving the target every month and they are very excited to receive their badges. I have never seen so many badges on our children’s jumpers as they continue to collect them and wear them with pride.

And earlier this month, Active Travel England announced that the programme is being funded for another year, allowing schools that already take part to continue at no additional cost. It also means more children can enjoy the benefits of walking and wheeling as Living Streets look to recruit more schools to take part in the programme.

Councillor Quesir Mahmood, Executive Member for Growth and Development said

It’s absolutely fantastic to see that students from primary schools across the borough are making an effort to travel sustainably to school, despite the wintery conditions that we’ve seen over the past few months.

The fact that figures have surpassed the government target is something our pupils should be incredibly proud of.

With the news of further funding, I look forward to hearing more about the great partnership between Living Streets and our schools in the coming year.

Daniel O’Connell from Living Streets said:

Blackburn with Darwen Borough Council have been an excellent partner. Together we’ve been able to engage schools and support them to reap the many benefits active travel offers.

Schools engaging with WOW are seeing real impact, not only is the programme eliminating unnecessary short car journeys to school in the mornings, but it’s also benefitting pupils’ physical and mental health.

It’s great to see the appetite for WOW is growing across primary schools in the borough and I look forward to continuing to work with more schools on the programme.

The seventeen schools currently taking part in the project are:

• Audley Junior School
• Cedars Primary School
• Daisyfield Primary School
• St. Barnabas CofE Primary Academy, Darwen
• Longshaw Community Junior School
• Queen Elizabeth’s Grammar School
• Roe Lee Park Primary School
• St. Antony’s RC Primary School
• St. Barnabas and St Paul’s Church of England Voluntary Aided Primary School
• St. Cuthbert’s Church of England Primary School
• St. Edward’s Roman Catholic Primary School Blackburn
• St. James’ Church of England Primary School, Earl Street
• St. Luke and St. Philips Church of England Primary School
• St. Matthew’s Church of England Primary School
• St. Stephen’s Church of England Primary School
• Sudell Primary School
• Wensley Fold Church of England Primary Academy

If you know of a school that would like to join other schools in the borough and take part in the ‘WOW’ project, please ask one of the school’s teachers to contact the project co-ordinator, Daniel O’Connell, by e-mailing daniel.oconnell@livingstreets.org.uk