The controversial plan to fine parents who park on zigzag lines at school gates – what headteachers really think

The headteacher is standing at the gate again, coffee going cold on the wall behind her, hi‑vis waistcoat over a blazer that was meant for assemblies, not traffic control. Cars nose up to the yellow zigzag lines as if they are suggestions rather than instructions. One driver hazards a quick “I’m literally two minutes” through the window, hazard lights blinking like a moral exemption.

Behind her, a line of children snakes along the pavement, bags swinging, scooters weaving between legs. A latecomer sprints. A reception child lets go of their parent’s hand at exactly the wrong moment. A car door flies open into the cycle lane.

On paper, the rules are blunt: those zigzags are a no‑stop zone. In real life, they are a negotiation, replayed twice a day, every weekday.

This year, in more and more parts of the country, that negotiation is changing. Councils are rolling out camera cars, automatic number‑plate recognition and on‑the‑spot fines for anyone who pulls up on the lines. Some parents say it’s about time. Others call it another tax on families. In the middle of it all stand headteachers, being quietly asked to pick a side.

Most of them will tell you: it’s not that simple.

The zigzags are not just paint

On a map, the area outside a school is a tiny strip of road. Up close, it is a moving, breathing junction of small children, buggies, bikes, delivery vans, buses, dogs on leads and teenagers with headphones in. You don’t need a risk assessment to see why the Highway Code treats it differently.

The yellow zigzag lines mean “keep clear” for a reason. They create sight lines so drivers can see a child before they step out, and so a child can see a car before it appears. When you park there, even for “just a second”, you erase that margin for error.

Headteachers collect near‑miss stories the way other people collect coffee loyalty stamps. A toddler darting between bumpers. A car reversing while a Year 2 class crosses. An ambulance trying to edge through a gridlock at 3.15pm.

They also carry a formal duty of care. If there is a serious accident outside the school gates, the head will be one of the people answering hard questions, even if the road technically “belongs” to the council.

So when they look at the zigzags, they don’t see a parking opportunity. They see safeguarding.

For most heads, the principle is not controversial: those lines must be kept clear. The argument starts when you ask how.

What schools are actually being asked to do

The new wave of enforcement plans looks tidy in a council report: high‑resolution cameras, fixed or mobile; automatic number‑plate recognition; Penalty Charge Notices of up to £70 for vehicles that stop on the zigzags during school hours. Some schemes share revenue between the council and the enforcement company. A few ask schools to host cameras on their land.

In practice, that means conversations like these in headteachers’ inboxes:

• Could you include our new fines in your newsletter?
• Can your office staff help us identify repeat offenders?
• Would you support a camera being mounted on your building?
• Can you speak to parents at drop‑off about enforcement?

None of this is technically a legal obligation. Roads are the council’s responsibility, not the school’s. But headteachers know that if they don’t communicate the scheme, they will still carry the fallout when the first tickets land on doormats.

They also know that school–home relationships are both fragile and precious. One £70 ticket might stop a parent parking on the lines. It might also push a struggling family over the edge, or sour trust within a community where attendance and engagement are already hard‑won.

“So you want me to keep children safe,” as one head in the Midlands put it, “but not become the face of a fine my parents can’t afford. Those two jobs do not always pull in the same direction.”

Why some headteachers back fines – and others wince

Spend time in staffrooms and headteacher WhatsApp groups and you hear a chorus of mixed feelings rather than a single party line. The divides do not fall neatly along political or geographical lines; they run through the middle of individual heads.

Roughly, their views sort into three overlapping camps.

1. The “we’ve tried everything else” heads

These are the leaders who have:

• Sent the polite letters.
• Held assemblies with children about road safety.
• Stood at the gate with a whistle and a warning smile.
• Invited PCSOs to do spot checks.
• Run “park and stride” schemes from a nearby car park.

They have still watched cars roll up on the zigzags every morning.

For them, fines feel like an unfortunate but necessary last resort. Not because they like the idea of parents losing money, but because nothing else has shifted behaviour consistently.

“I don’t want parents fined,” one London primary head said, “but I want a child even less to be hit. If enforcement is what finally makes people take the lines seriously, I will support it.”

These heads tend to frame the scheme as external: “The council will be enforcing the law,” rather than “We are fining you.” They want the school to stay on the side of safety, not punishment.

2. The “not like this” heads

Others agree the zigzags must be kept clear, but are deeply uneasy with the way enforcement is being rolled out.

Their worries sound like this:

• The flat‑rate fine hits low‑income families hardest.
• Automated cameras can’t see context (a medical emergency, a broken‑down car).
• Revenue‑sharing models risk looking like cash‑generation rather than safety.
• There’s no realistic alternative parking for parents with babies or disabled relatives.

They also dread the administrative tail. Every ticket prompts a conversation at the school office, even if the school had nothing to do with it. Staff end up mediating between angry parents and a faceless enforcement team they don’t control.

Some of these heads would prefer:

• Short “education first” periods where warnings are issued before fines.
• Discretionary waivers for blue badge holders and clearly marked SEND drop‑off bays.
• Visible, human enforcement officers rather than remote cameras, so nuanced judgement is possible.

They are not defending bad parking. They are asking who gets to decide what counts as “bad” in complex, messy real life.

3. The “change the street, not just the driver” heads

A third group sees the fines debate as a sign that the whole approach to school streets is too narrow.

They point out that:

• Many primary schools were built decades ago, in streets never designed for hundreds of cars.
• Public transport is patchy, especially in rural and edge‑of‑town areas.
• Staggered start times, walking buses and bike shelters are cheaper and friendlier than camera vans.

Their instinct is to push for structural changes:

• School Streets that close roads to through‑traffic at drop‑off and pick‑up.
• Zebra crossings, wider pavements and 20mph zones.
• Subsidised bus routes scheduled around school times.

In that vision, fines are not the main act but a side note – used sparingly, in a redesigned space where driving up to the gate is neither convenient nor necessary.

The messy reality of the school run

It’s easy, from a safe distance, to imagine that every parent who parks on the zigzags is lazy or entitled. Stand at the gate for a week and the picture blurs.

You’ll see:

• A mum juggling a pram, a toddler and a child with additional needs who refuses to walk more than a few metres.
• A dad working two jobs, dropping children off in a ten‑minute window between shifts.
• Grandparents who can’t walk far but are the only ones available for pick‑up.
• Families in estates with no safe route on foot: no pavements, heavy lorries, blind corners.

Headteachers hold all these stories in their heads at once alongside the story nobody wants: the one where a child doesn’t make it across the road.

This is why the debate feels so combustible. Every side can point to a real risk. Safety, poverty, access and enforcement all collide in front of the same gate.

The result is that headteachers often find themselves improvising local solutions around a national law:

• Allowing blue badge holders to use a tiny stretch of driveway right by the entrance.
• Creating separate drop‑off points for pupils with specific mobility or sensory needs.
• Agreeing informal “no‑ticket” zones for the first weeks of term to give new parents time to adjust.

None of these nuances are captured in the stark image of a camera van issuing automatic fines on a damp Tuesday morning.

What headteachers say would actually help

When you ask heads what would make the biggest difference to safety at the school gate, their answers are strikingly consistent, regardless of their view on fines.

They talk less about punishment and more about design, predictability and partnership.

Common suggestions include:

• Safer street layouts
  Wider pavements, proper crossings, speed humps and clearly marked no‑parking areas that make “doing the right thing” the easiest option.

• Time‑limited road closures
  School Streets schemes where non‑resident traffic is banned for 30–45 minutes at drop‑off and pick‑up, with clear exemptions for residents and disability access.

• Real alternatives to driving
  Reliable buses on school‑friendly timetables, cycle lanes that don’t end abruptly, supervised walking buses from local car parks or community centres.

• Genuine consultation
  Involving school leaders, governors, parents and pupils before enforcement is introduced, so rules reflect the realities of that specific site.

• Clear, humane transitions
  Grace periods, warning letters, and support for families who genuinely struggle to find a safe alternative, before the full fine regime bites.

In other words: design a system that assumes most people want to do the right thing, then help them to do it, and reserve fines for the small group who persist in putting others at risk.

How it feels inside a headteacher’s office

If you reduce the debate to “pro‑fine” versus “anti‑fine”, you miss the emotional freight headteachers carry when they talk about it. Their reflections often sit somewhere between frustration and fatigue.

A simplified version looks like this:

View from the gate	What it sounds like in the staffroom	Underlying worry
“We need enforcement”	“I’m tired of begging adults to obey road markings we teach Year 1s to understand.”	A serious injury will happen on my watch.
“Not more fines”	“My families are already choosing between heating and food; now we’re adding tickets?”	We will damage trust with the people we most need to reach.
“Change the street”	“We’re stuck firefighting symptoms because nobody will fund the cure.”	Schools will be blamed for roads they don’t control.

In quieter moments, many heads admit to a small, gnawing fear: whatever they do, it will not be enough. If an accident does happen, every letter, meeting and patrol will be replayed in hindsight as either too soft or too harsh.

They also know that, beyond the headlines, they will be the ones standing at the gate the next morning, facing parents’ questions with no luxury of hiding behind a policy document.

Where this leaves parents – and what you can do

Strip away the technology and the argument and one thing is painfully simple: the safest place for a car at school time is not on the zigzags. That has always been true, cameras or not.

For parents, a few small shifts can make a bigger difference than any enforcement van:

• Treat the zigzags as a red line, not a grey area.
• Build in five extra minutes so you’re not forced into bad decisions by lateness.
• If you must drive, park a street or two away and walk the last stretch.
• Talk to the school if you have specific access needs; most heads will bend over backwards to find a safe solution.
• Back school leaders when they push for safer street designs, even if the changes are inconvenient at first.

None of this solves the wider questions about fines, equity and enforcement models. Those need honest debate between councils, schools and communities, not just press releases and angry Facebook threads.

But they do honour the one priority almost everyone shares: children should be able to arrive at and leave school without dodging wing mirrors.

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FAQ:

• Are schools the ones issuing the fines for parking on zigzag lines?
  No. Enforcement is carried out by local authorities (or contractors acting for them). Schools may be asked to share information or host cameras, but they do not set the fines or receive the revenue.
• Can councils really fine you for “just stopping” on the zigzags?
  Yes. The “keep clear” markings outside schools usually mean no stopping at all during the signed hours, not even to drop a child off. Cameras or wardens can issue Penalty Charge Notices based on very short stops.
• What if I have a blue badge or a child with additional needs?
  Blue badges do not automatically override school zigzag restrictions, but many schools and councils create specific access arrangements. Speak to the headteacher or SENCO; do not assume a camera will recognise your situation.
• Do headteachers actually want parents to be fined?
  Most heads want the lines kept clear and children kept safe; their views on fines as the tool to achieve that are mixed. Many support targeted enforcement but worry about fairness, relationships and the lack of alternatives for some families.
• How can I raise concerns about a new enforcement scheme?
  Start with the official council consultation or transport team, copying in the school if appropriate. Be specific about your circumstances and, where possible, suggest practical alternatives rather than simply opposing the scheme.