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Attention to parent taxis: Confusing situations often arise in front of schools because parents bring their children there by car.

Photo: Martin Möller / Funke Photo Services

Because school is on the way to work, the weather is bad or the journey is supposedly safer, many children are taken to school by their parents in the morning.

However, such parent taxis regularly cause chaos on the streets, which endangers students.

In order to be able to take action against parent taxis, cities and municipalities should, in the opinion of the German Association of Cities, be given more scope for action as soon as possible.

»Unfortunately, too many parents still want to bring their children to the school door in their own car.

At the same time, other children are running or cycling with their school bags and gym bags in between and have to push past cars that are parking and leaving,” said City Council President Markus Lewe (CDU) to the newspapers of the Funke media group.

This is confusing and sometimes dangerous for everyone involved.

»We municipalities know best how traffic can be regulated more relaxed locally because we know the situation.

There is no blueprint for this, but individual solutions must be found," Lewe continued.

Cities and communities should decide for themselves, in consultation with schools and parents, what makes sense, “without always having to go to great lengths to prove a specific danger situation.”

Lewe also spoke out in favor of temporarily closing roads: Regulating this through a state decree could help in certain areas.

At the same time, he made it clear: “But we need a nationwide and legally secure solution.”

The ADAC has been advising against parent taxis for a long time.

Traffic tests have shown that tense situations in front of schools could be defused if safety zones were set up before classes start and end.

Another argument: Children learn much more about road safety when they actively participate instead of just riding in the car.

This is what some traffic experts and educators say.

Walking or cycling to school also strengthens the self-confidence and independence of girls and boys and promotes motor skills and social skills.

In North Rhine-Westphalia, consequences were already drawn at the beginning of the year.

Targeted closures are now permitted in the immediate vicinity of schools.

Reform of the road traffic law called for

Around 3,200 cities and municipalities with around 53 million inhabitants have come together in the German Association of Cities.

Lewe, who is also the mayor of Münster, called for more discretion for the municipalities in traffic planning and control.

"That's why we appeal to the states and the federal government to finally call the mediation committee and get the urgently needed amendment to the Road Traffic Act back on track."

The law passed by the Bundestag on new road traffic regulations did not achieve the required majority in the Bundesrat.

The reform of the Road Traffic Act and the amendment to the Road Traffic Regulations based on it are intended to enable cities and municipalities to make more decisions, for example to set up bus lanes and 30 km/h zones.

The federal government or the Bundestag now have the opportunity to call the mediation committee to negotiate compromises with the states.

However, after the reform failed in the Federal Council, the Federal Ministry of Transport signaled in December that it initially saw no point in calling the Mediation Committee.

The ministry said that the states would first have to position themselves and explain what they wanted.

alw/dpa