Lived Experience: Evaluating the John Perryn Primary School Street Scheme in a Deprived London Catchment
School Street schemes are expanding rapidly across London as part of efforts to reduce child road danger and create safer school environments. While borough-level evaluations often report traffic reductions, less is known about how these schemes are experienced by the parents and residents who interact with them daily.
This paper presents a mixed-methods evaluation of the John Perryn Primary School Street in Ealing (West London), combining collision data, automated traffic counts and semi-structured interviews with parents (n=5) and residents (n=5).
Quantitative findings were indicative of a reduction in recorded collisions within the surrounding treatment area in the six months following implementation, while motor traffic during operational periods declined. However, the lived experience data reveals a more nuanced picture.
Parents consistently described a ‘calmer core’ at the school gate, reporting increased confidence in their children’s safety, improved air quality and greater opportunities for social interaction. Some noted increased willingness to allow independent mobility. At the same time, residents and time-constrained families highlighted boundary displacement, compliance confusion and parking pressures outside the restriction zone. Structural constraints such as distance, employment patterns and caring responsibilities limited full modal shift for some households.
The findings suggest that School Streets operate not only as a traffic management tool, but as socially mediated safety interventions whose legitimacy depends on clarity, fairness and network-level design. The presentation concludes with practical recommendations for boundary management, equity-sensitive enforcement, and improved community engagement to strengthen long-term road safety outcomes.
Nii Okai Nunoo, Graduate Transport Planner and Traffic Engineer, Norman Rourke Pryme
Nii Okai Nunoo is a Graduate Transport Planner and Traffic Engineer at Norman Rourke Pryme, where he works across transport planning and traffic engineering projects.
He holds an MSc in Civil Engineering with Transport from University College London, awarded with Distinction, and a place on TfL’s Youth Panel, where he engages with strategic discussions on road safety, active travel and inclusive transport policy.
His research focuses on active travel, road safety and transport equity, with particular interest in how interventions function differently across socioeconomic contexts. His dissertation evaluating the John Perryn Primary School Street scheme was conducted as part of his MSc at UCL and the London Borough of Ealing Council.
Nii Okai is a Graduate Member of both the Chartered Institution of Highways and Transportation (CIHT) and the Institution of Civil Engineers (ICE).