WE know it as the school run, but that is a misnomer. More accurately, it is the "school stop-start-double park", the mini rush hour which frays nerves and clutches in equal measure.

Only days into the new school year and the problem has already pitted parent against resident. Today those living in Queen Anne's Road, York, were resuming their protest against traffic chaos in their narrow street caused by parents dropping off pupils at St Olave's School.

This is the most public demonstration of a city-wide predicament. York motorists have enjoyed six blissful weeks of roads freed from school traffic: now they are struggling in the jams again. The city council estimates that 20 per cent of peak-time traffic is accounted for by the school run.

Parents' insistence on taking their children to school by car surprises those from earlier generations who thought nothing of walking there and back, whatever the distance.

It is wrong to dismiss car dependence as laziness, however, although that is sometimes a factor. Working parents often feel they have little alternative than to take the car, as they combine the school run with their daily commute.

Then there is the fear factor: fear that the children will be a target for what one parent on this page calls "weirdoes and idiots"; fear that they will be hurt on roads crammed, ironically, with school run traffic.

But delivering children from front door to school gate in the car is unhealthy. They are deprived of freedom and exercise. They cannot learn to be streetwise from the passenger seat.

There is no single solution. The Government is pushing the idea of staggered school start times to reduce congestion. But the council is right to look at ways to encourage children to walk and cycle to school. More "walking buses", which combine security with exercise, would be a real step forward.

Updated: 11:53 Tuesday, September 09, 2003