Efforts by parents and pupils at a Derbyshire primary school to cycle or walk to school each day have led to a 92% reduction in car use.

Just three per cent of the 240 children are now dropped off by car at William Gilbert Endowed Primary School and Nursery in Duffield near Belper, as families took part in a campaign championing greener, more active ways of getting to the classroom, according to Derbyshire Live.

The school launched Derbyshire’s only car-free school street previously and has now won a top UK award for its active travel projects encouraging children to walk, scoot and cycle.

It won a national Mode Shift Month travel award and was among organisations such as London’s Luton Airport, Bedfordshire Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Derbyshire County Council in receiving a top Modeshift STARS travel award at a ceremony at The Royal Society in London.

The prize for William Gilbert comes around a year after it launched the school street – a temporary traffic order which prohibits cars from Vicarage Lane, the narrow road on which the school is based, at drop off and pick up times.

The school has also been working with Living Streets to promote the benefits of walking to school with park and stride locations in the local area, where parents can park and walk to school in groups, recognising that some families who travel out of the area cannot be completely car-free.

The past four years of active campaigning by the school have reduced the percentage of pupils being driven to school from 37% to 3% and 20% of pupils now cycle or scoot to school – up from zero in 2022.

The school, which is part of the Derby Diocesan Academy Trust, was one of only 75 schools in the country to be given an “outstanding” rating under the Modeshift Stars scheme for its long-lasting and impactful work in what was called a “stand-out entry”.

(Picture: Courtesy of Penguin PR)