Are walking routes and times taken into account for determining walking zones?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would so much rather have my kid get 40 minutes of exercise walking to school than sit on a bus.

I get the bus when it saves time, but walking is better when it’s an option.

You must not have a high school kid who has to get up so early to walk 40 min. They don’t get enough sleep already.

I have 3 high schoolers. I don’t see why 40 minutes of walking would mean getting up earlier than a 40 minute bus ride, and early morning exercise in the sun is great for resetting the biological clock.

Let's say your kid needs to be at school 10 minutes before the first class bell. 7:35 am. Add in a 40 minute walk, but let's give 45 minutes to be safe. They leave at 6:55 am. That's before sunrise for a significant chunk of the school year. You want your child walking in the dark? They're not getting early morning exercise in the sun.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I would so much rather have my kid get 40 minutes of exercise walking to school than sit on a bus.

I get the bus when it saves time, but walking is better when it’s an option.

You must not have a high school kid who has to get up so early to walk 40 min. They don’t get enough sleep already.

I have 3 high schoolers. I don’t see why 40 minutes of walking would mean getting up earlier than a 40 minute bus ride, and early morning exercise in the sun is great for resetting the biological clock.

Let's say your kid needs to be at school 10 minutes before the first class bell. 7:35 am. Add in a 40 minute walk, but let's give 45 minutes to be safe. They leave at 6:55 am. That's before sunrise for a significant chunk of the school year. You want your child walking in the dark? They're not getting early morning exercise in the sun.

We used to live a little bit under a mile away from a public bus stop.

While it was close, it wasn't a nice walk to do every day.

It was a factor for us in shopping for our next home and it's much nicer to be closer to a bus stop.

It's not just about getting exercise on a nice day. It's also having to get to and from school when it's pouring or snowing.

I'd like to know if the posters saying that they'd be happy if their kids got the exercise every morning actually have their kids do the walk every day. Or are they just saying hypothetically they'd be open to it. It's a little bit different situation when someone actually has to do it.

Let's say kids are/or should be a little bit more resilient and we understand MCPS is trying to stretch things due to budget issues. So a mile might be reasonable but once approaching two miles, depending on the walk, I think it becomes questionable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I made some of these comments in the boundary threads but they probably got buried so wanted to bring it up in it's own thread.

Looking at the potential walking zones for high schools, according to Google Maps some walks will take forty to forty five minutes and along busy nonresidential commuter routes.

In board meetings, board members talk about how forty minute bus rides are not ideal.

I would think that a forty minute walk would be considered even worse. Where if kids are on a bus, they can at least just sit and enjoy the ride. But with walking, they need to carry their book bag, instrument, sports equipment in the heat, snow or rain.

I've seen instances where MCPS cancelled schools while kids were already at the bus stops. So kids walking to school would have already been on their way to school. And have seen kids slip and fall on their butts when walking on the sidewalks in the snow to school.

And even if kids ride their bike to school, it would be hard to carry everything on a bike and it's not really possible when there's snow and ice on the ground.

When determining walking zones, does MCPS take into account the route and time it would take to walk? And if they do, is forty minutes considered acceptable? Or do they just mostly count anything within a specified radius as the walking zone?

I know there are some areas for my kids school that gets bus service that are within two miles from the school. But I think the walking route doesn't have sidewalks and may be why they get bus service.

And I know, I know, in the old days people used to 5 to 10 miles, uphill, barefoot in the snow to school. But times are different now. With more traffic, more books and other school related things they carry, and kids just do different things then back then.

There might not be routes in each neighborhood (not sure how those bus routes are actually planned) but taking the free-for-all RideOn bus (county bus) could be faster than walking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

[Anonymous]

This is another reason parents get bogus diagnoses- they can get front door bus service.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I made some of these comments in the boundary threads but they probably got buried so wanted to bring it up in it's own thread.

Looking at the potential walking zones for high schools, according to Google Maps some walks will take forty to forty five minutes and along busy nonresidential commuter routes.

In board meetings, board members talk about how forty minute bus rides are not ideal.

I would think that a forty minute walk would be considered even worse. Where if kids are on a bus, they can at least just sit and enjoy the ride. But with walking, they need to carry their book bag, instrument, sports equipment in the heat, snow or rain.

I've seen instances where MCPS cancelled schools while kids were already at the bus stops. So kids walking to school would have already been on their way to school. And have seen kids slip and fall on their butts when walking on the sidewalks in the snow to school.

And even if kids ride their bike to school, it would be hard to carry everything on a bike and it's not really possible when there's snow and ice on the ground.

When determining walking zones, does MCPS take into account the route and time it would take to walk? And if they do, is forty minutes considered acceptable? Or do they just mostly count anything within a specified radius as the walking zone?

I know there are some areas for my kids school that gets bus service that are within two miles from the school. But I think the walking route doesn't have sidewalks and may be why they get bus service.

And I know, I know, in the old days people used to 5 to 10 miles, uphill, barefoot in the snow to school. But times are different now. With more traffic, more books and other school related things they carry, and kids just do different things then back then.

There might not be routes in each neighborhood (not sure how those bus routes are actually planned) but taking the free-for-all RideOn bus (county bus) could be faster than walking.

RideOn bus doesn’t have any routes to many schools

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I made some of these comments in the boundary threads but they probably got buried so wanted to bring it up in it's own thread.

Looking at the potential walking zones for high schools, according to Google Maps some walks will take forty to forty five minutes and along busy nonresidential commuter routes.

In board meetings, board members talk about how forty minute bus rides are not ideal.

I would think that a forty minute walk would be considered even worse. Where if kids are on a bus, they can at least just sit and enjoy the ride. But with walking, they need to carry their book bag, instrument, sports equipment in the heat, snow or rain.

I've seen instances where MCPS cancelled schools while kids were already at the bus stops. So kids walking to school would have already been on their way to school. And have seen kids slip and fall on their butts when walking on the sidewalks in the snow to school.

And even if kids ride their bike to school, it would be hard to carry everything on a bike and it's not really possible when there's snow and ice on the ground.

When determining walking zones, does MCPS take into account the route and time it would take to walk? And if they do, is forty minutes considered acceptable? Or do they just mostly count anything within a specified radius as the walking zone?

I know there are some areas for my kids school that gets bus service that are within two miles from the school. But I think the walking route doesn't have sidewalks and may be why they get bus service.

And I know, I know, in the old days people used to 5 to 10 miles, uphill, barefoot in the snow to school. But times are different now. With more traffic, more books and other school related things they carry, and kids just do different things then back then.

There might not be routes in each neighborhood (not sure how those bus routes are actually planned) but taking the free-for-all RideOn bus (county bus) could be faster than walking.

That's another issue for our particular neighborhood.

Where the first issue is that we currently get bus service to another school but are designated for a walking zone to another. And the issue being that the walk would be about 40 minutes along busy commuter routes for that new school.

The other issue is that we have a bus stop right in front of our neighborhood that goes right by the currently assigned schools(all three, the ES, MS and HS) in about ten or fifteen minutes. There is no direct bus service that goes to the new school. With the closest stops being about a fifteen to twenty minute walk to get to. And one of them requiring transfers to get to the school.

So it seems that not only should walkability and time be taken into account but also the possibility of public transportation in determining school zones.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

The boundary study options assign most kids to schools that close to their homes. There are a few elementary school catchment areas for which an option suggests busing kids relatively far (e.g. 6 miles) but these are not remotely the majority of students. And it is just one of 4 options in the Woodward study for example.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

The boundary study options assign most kids to schools that close to their homes. There are a few elementary school catchment areas for which an option suggests busing kids relatively far (e.g. 6 miles) but these are not remotely the majority of students. And it is just one of 4 options in the Woodward study for example.

There is also a 6-region program thing which will bus kids across the county and adds possibly one hundred or more of bus routes.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

The boundary study options assign most kids to schools that close to their homes. There are a few elementary school catchment areas for which an option suggests busing kids relatively far (e.g. 6 miles) but these are not remotely the majority of students. And it is just one of 4 options in the Woodward study for example.

There is also a 6-region program thing which will bus kids across the county and adds possibly one hundred or more of bus routes.

Omg you are just pulling numbers out of your a$$

[Anonymous]

Are realtors following all this? Prepare to help sell and help buyers soon.

Traffic is SO bad in most of Montgomery county despite the Big Bus or whatever rapid bus services that have started in certain corridors. Do NOT bus students across county!!!

[Anonymous]

[img]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

The boundary study options assign most kids to schools that close to their homes. There are a few elementary school catchment areas for which an option suggests busing kids relatively far (e.g. 6 miles) but these are not remotely the majority of students. And it is just one of 4 options in the Woodward study for example.

There is also a 6-region program thing which will bus kids across the county and adds possibly one hundred or more of bus routes.

Omg you are just pulling numbers out of your a$$

That’s just combinatorics based on 6 regions with 5 high schools each hosting a program for other school students in the same region to attend and also provide bus service as they claimed in the presentation. Pretty simple math.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:[img]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The answer is that wealthy parents drive/carpool kids that live 1.5-2 miles from their high school or advocate for buses on the basis that the walk is not "safe". And they disingenuously flip out at the possibility in the boundary options of their kids not being assigned to the "walkable" school they would never actually walk to. Other kids take the public buses or walk.

So MCPS should give up this stupid 2 mile walk zone policy and change to 1 mile which is more practical.

Then less opposition for diversity bus.

Not necessarily the same thing. MCPS should keep bus time within 10-15 min. Not across the county. Expect any student to walk 2 mile each way is unreasonable

This costs money. Also, many people currently live over 6 miles from their assigned high school. They aren't going to get to school in 10 minutes.

MCPS doesn’t care about money. They want to bus kids across the county. Now you’re telling me they can’t bus kids who have to walk 40 min to school?

The boundary study options assign most kids to schools that close to their homes. There are a few elementary school catchment areas for which an option suggests busing kids relatively far (e.g. 6 miles) but these are not remotely the majority of students. And it is just one of 4 options in the Woodward study for example.

There is also a 6-region program thing which will bus kids across the county and adds possibly one hundred or more of bus routes.

Omg you are just pulling numbers out of your a$$

That’s just combinatorics based on 6 regions with 5 high schools each hosting a program for other school students in the same region to attend and also provide bus service as they claimed in the presentation. Pretty simple math.