My kid takes the bus, so I was completely flabbergasted to learn from friends that sometime between the time we were in school in the 1980s and 90s and when our kids are in school today, pick-up and drop-off lines have become complete nightmares. In fact, some parents report waiting literal hours to collect their children.
The issue can be hard to understand — like, how big or disorganized does a school have to be for pick-up to be that slow and/or chaotic?
Over on Reddit/Parenting one mom wanted other parents to explain, “just for fun” what the deal with long pick-up lines is, exactly.
“I see so many posts about how parents have to line up for the school pickup line 1-2 hours before school is even out due to the line just taking forever,” she writes. “I am so curious on how many kids attend your school where that is an issue? Our school has no buses and so kids either have to walk/bike/parent pickup and our pickup line is finished within 20 minutes of school getting out. For reference, our school has 300-400 kids.”
Well… people have feelings about pick-up lines and they did not hold back in the comments. Some parents ranted about how idiotic it is to go early and wait, while others defended showing up so early by explaining their strategies and schedules. It got heated very fast.
“All these idiots go park in line at the school every day,” writes one dad. “The line starts forming easily two hours before school lets out. I have no fucking idea why they do this. If you wait and show up about 10-15 minutes after school lets out, then you’re in and out in less than 10 minutes. My kid can wait outside for a couple of minutes instead of having me or my wife sit there idling a car burning fuel for 2 damned hours. People are crazy.”
Many people agreed with this comment, adding that the lines mess up traffic in the area and smog up the air.
But others explained that a lot of parents aren’t there by choice. A lot of parents cited after school activities, work schedules, and having to pick up multiple kids at different schools. A few parents explained that younger kids nap in the car while they wait.
A number of parents explained that sitting in their car and answering emails or reading a book was way better than the chaos of not showing up early.
“I’m an early one and there’s a few reasons why,” one person wrote. “First, the line is chaotic and nobody seems to know wtf is going on. This has been the case across multiple schools, so I know the problem isn’t just a bad pickup layout. I’m talking parking lot accidents, people screaming at each other and honking — pure chaos. But second, I end up trapped and it causes me a lot of anxiety. It sucks having to be there so early and wait in my car for so long and it pisses me off to no end that nobody has figured out a better way yet. If I’m first in line, I get my kid and get home within 15 min of school letting out. If I’m late to the line, that turns into almost 45 minutes from school out to home.”
One parent said that as soon as a local sheriff started ticketing people for idling in front of the school, the problem was solved.
“My county’s sheriffs finally started ticketing people for it this year,” they wrote. “They sent out tons of warnings and advance notice for months beforehand that it would be happening and yet people still got outraged when they actually started doing it. Everyone got pissed off that they were getting fined for being ‘stuck in a traffic jam.’ Within a few days that traffic jam, which has been clogging both lanes of the main road in town and blocking side streets for 20 years at least, suddenly cleared up.”
Other parents pointed out that poor planning is the reason for many delays. Many schools don’t have buses or have limited bus lines, but they also don’t have adequate parking in the area to handle large pick-ups.
“I think the issue is so many places have built their schools along highways and in terrible locations so there is literally nowhere to park,” one person simply said.
Another added, “Many schools were built with the thought that all kids would walk or bus, but that’s no longer the case.”
“Lots of rural and even suburban schools don’t offer busing anymore,” another said. “And depending on the location of the school, it’s not safe for kids to walk. Our district is small and rural. The elementary school is located on a long road with no sidewalks. And folks tend to drive fast on that road. It’s not safe for anyone to walk on.”
It sounds like this issue isn’t about wacky parents or people using the pick-up lane wrong as much as it is about a disconnect between how our schools were built and how administrators expect kids to show up there. Without buses or safe ways to walk, we might be stuck in pick-up lines into the future.
