Walking bus

In Britain a group of schoolchildren walking together in a long line of pairs on an activity without stops or pickups, escorted by teachers, has been referred to as a crocodile since at least 1870.

This has led to criticism that the walking bus is too regimented, and fails to achieve its original purpose of improving children's independent mobility.

[11] As of 2023[update] the largest single walking bus according to the Guinness Book of Records had 1,905 participants, on 9 November 2012 in Newmarket, Suffolk.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in the USA, report that the prevalence of obesity among children has doubled and among adolescents has quadrupled in the past 30 years.

The built environment consists of the human-made surroundings that affect one's life; including the availability and quality of sidewalks, crosswalks and parks, the amount of traffic and proximity to schools/parks/shops, etc.

[21] In a study of adolescents, 100% of the students who walked both to and from school met the recommended levels of 60 or more minutes of moderate to vigorous physical activity on weekdays.

[22] In a pilot, randomized controlled trial (RCT) in Houston, Texas, children who were assigned to a Walking School Bus group increased their weekly rate of active commuting by 38.0% over a five-week period, while children assigned to a no intervention group decreased their active commuting rate by a small margin.

[24] The program's purpose is to: “enable and encourage children, including those with disabilities, to walk and bicycle to school; to make walking and bicycling to school safe and more appealing; and to facilitate the planning, development and implementation of projects that will improve safety, and reduce traffic, fuel consumption, and air pollution in the vicinity of schools.” It is a 100% federally funded program which is administered by state departments of transportation.

Money goes towards infrastructure-related programs in addition to non-infrastructure activities such as education and enforcement-year time period, restricting data to school-travel hours.

[25] According to the Institute of Medicine Report, Measuring Progress in Obesity Prevention, the environment people live in can have a profound effect on the amount of physical activity which they engage in.

According to James Sallis in his workshop presentation, informal or formal policies issued by the government or private sector, can affect physical activity in four ways.

First, zoning, building codes, public transportation and recreational facility policies affect the ability to engage in physical activity.

Policies providing incentives such as parking and commuting in other ways, and insurance subsidies promote walkability and physical activity for adults.

Healthy People 2020 lists objectives to boost physical activity and also supports the recording of national data to track interventions.