"Once upon a time, walking and biking to school was commonplace; now it is a rarity. The Federal Highway Administration has reported that roughly half of all 5 to 18 year olds either walked or biked to school in 1969. The journey to school has changed dramatically in the intervening years. By 2001, nearly 9 out of 10 children between the ages of 5 and 15 were driven to school by either a parent or a bus driver, adding additional traffic to the morning commute and negatively affecting communities around schools. In Marin County, California, for example, as much as 21 to 27 percent of the county's morning traffic is made up of parents driving their children to school." Read more...

Source: bikewalk.org, Introduction to Safe Routes to School Initiative