A new data platform developed with Department for Transport funding could help crack one of Britain’s toughest transport problems: the school run.
The morning drop-off now makes up more than a quarter of rush-hour traffic in cities such as London. Since 2005, the proportion of children driven to school in England has risen by 23%, while the number walking has fallen – a shift driven in part by cuts to bus services. The result is gridlocked roads, rising emissions, and mounting costs for councils.
The STEP platform, created by UK start-up HomeRun, uses artificial intelligence and national data to map how children travel to school. It shows councils where walking, cycling or public transport could realistically replace car journeys – without headteachers having to run surveys or spend scarce time on travel plans.
HomeRun aims to cut the proportion of pupils being driven from 37% to under 10% by 2035, equivalent to 650 million fewer car journeys. By analysing anonymised postcode data alongside social and geographical factors, STEP can pinpoint where safer crossings, new cycle routes or targeted bus subsidies would make the biggest difference.
For the first time, councils can plan school travel at county or even national scale. A portion of the data will be made freely available to transport planners, helping to unlock funding and target interventions where they will have the greatest impact.
Essex has been one of the first to test the model. With only one officer to cover over 520 schools, the county previously managed to work with just 35 schools a year. STEP has now modelled journeys for more than 210,000 pupils across all state schools, giving Essex County Council insight it has never had before.
The results are already paying off. Essex has used the data to underpin a major funding bid for 30 new School Streets – one of the biggest schemes outside London – in a county that previously had none.
Helen Akpabio, Essex’s Active Travel Manager said: ‘STEP is allowing us to pinpoint the most effective interventions for our schools and identify the geographic areas where they will have the greatest impact, saving us time, money, and effort.
‘The equity implications are also profound. For the first time, all schools in Essex are assessed on a level playing field – no longer dependent on PTA enthusiasm or staff bandwidth. Interventions can be focused where they are most needed, not where engagement is most responsive.’
Pooya Kamvari, HomeRun Founder and CEO added: ‘If the trends we’ve seen in Essex were scaled nationally, we could ramp up active travel on the school run, take 650 million car trips off the road, slash peak-traffic emissions, and reshape communities around healthier, active, more sustainable transport. That’s the power of using data and AI ethically, turning good intentions into real-world impact.’
Photo: Alice Bing
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