School sees huge changes as a result of walking to school project

Not only have the students from St Luke & St Philip’s Primary School dramatically increased how much they walk to school, but they’ve also seen the environment outside their school transformed.

Based off Galligreaves Way in Blackburn and headed up by headteacher Samantha O’Connell, St Luke & St Philip’s is a school of 200 children from a range of backgrounds, with 25 different languages spoken at home.

A free initiative funded by Active Travel England, the school has been taking part in the Walk to School Outreach project since February 2024, which is co-ordinated by the council and run by charity Living Streets.

Currently, 17 schools across the borough take part in the initiative, which sees children log their journey to school and win badges for walking/wheeling or cycling just once a week.

In fact, in the last academic year (September 2024 to July 2025), pupils at the school recorded 20,630 walk all-the-way trips to school in the morning. In percentage terms, walk all the way journeys increased from a baseline of 59.5% to 70.6%.

All the way car journeys to school dropped from a baseline of 35.8% to 22.2%, a reduction in 13.6% points. As a result of their efforts, the students were awarded 1392 badges in the last academic year.

Not only has the project meant that children now walk to school more, either from home or by parking and striding, meaning their parents park further away from the school so they can walk the rest of the journey; but it’s also allowed the school to have the opportunity to undertake a route audit.

This saw a working group from the school, council, Living Streets and the community come together to look at the route children take to walk to school and raise any concerns and recommendations for improvements.

One of the main issues that arose from this audit was that cars could access a side street by the school, meaning that it became a fly-tipping hotspot. Also, there was no hard standing footway around the perimeter of the school, which meant it became very muddy and wet in bad weather. Railings protecting children on the footway were also bent.

A report was compiled based on the findings and the council acted swiftly to make huge improvements.

These small tweaks have made a huge difference to the school. A bollard has been added to stop people accessing the side street. A brand-new tarmacked footway for the children to be able to walk around the school has been created and double yellow lines have also been extended to make it safer for the children congregating outside the school, as cars cannot park there. New railings have also been installed.

Daniel O’Connell, Project Co-ordinator for Living Streets said:

St Luke and St Philip’s CE Primary School has shown exceptional commitment to encouraging active travel.

By working closely with the school community to carry out a School Route Audit and gather feedback on local street conditions, the council received valuable recommendations for infrastructure improvements. It’s fantastic to see the positive impact these changes have made to the surrounding area.

Samantha O’Connell, headteacher for the school says:

We feel like we belong now. Before I felt like the area was being completely neglected.

Councillor Quesir Mahmood, Executive Member for Growth & Development said:

The school route audit has had a significant impact and has encouraged children to take up the initiative; and we’ve seen that grow from day one to now, with the school ranking third in the Blackburn with Darwen borough council rankings in terms of how many walking to school journeys are logged.

We are immensely proud of the partnership that we have with Living Streets and schools across the borough to make this initiative a real success.

Councillor Phil Riley, Leader of the council said:

We’re famous in Blackburn with Darwen borough council for the work that we do with partnerships.

It’s now a lovely environment; and the children are very proud of it.

We’ve also got significantly large numbers of children who are walking to school which is good for the environment. It’s just generally a very good story.

Councillor Julie Gunn, Executive Member for Children, Young People & Education said:

I’d really like to see 100% of schools taking part in the walking to school outreach project, because what it does is have a really positive impact on the health of the pupils, on the health of their families and those in the community around them.

They come to school ready to learn, raring to go. What could be better?

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.