A scheme banning parents from dropping off their children at school by car is in doubt because volunteers enforcing it say they are facing rising levels of abuse.

Officials from Robert Kett Primary School, in Wymondham, say they are not able to recruit enough people to impose the restrictions, at pick up and drop off times.

They blame abuse facing volunteers for the shortage - including "unpleasant and aggressive shouting"  -  and say it has got worse the longer the project has run.

The School Streets scheme was launched as an 18-month trial in May 2022 in a bid to improve air quality and traffic safety around schools.

Initially, three schools were taking part, but the two others have already dropped out.

Robert Kett was the only site to continue with the scheme, which involves volunteers putting up temporary road closures and diverting drivers away from the site.

Although it declared the trial a success and made it permanent in November last year, now the school could also abandon the scheme after volunteers say they have been receiving worsening abuse from motorists.

A report going before councillors states that the abuse has made it harder for the school to convince people to help out.

It reads: "At Robert Kett Primary School, this order was made permanent in November 2023 in order to allow the School Streets to continue beyond the initial trial period.

"However, since that time, the school has found it increasingly challenging to recruit and maintain volunteers to support the road closure, and unfortunately levels of abuse towards volunteers from drivers has increased to levels significantly higher than experienced earlier on in the trial.

"It is not therefore possible to have volunteers every day of the week. On these days, although general traffic remains restricted past the school, some drivers are ignoring this."

This same issue saw the other two schools taking part in the trial - Dussindale Primary and Browick Road in Wymondham – abandon the scheme.

The difficulty in recruiting volunteers has made the road closures hard to enforce, leading to some motorists to consistently flout the rules by mounting pavements and driving around barriers.

The traffic order, which applies between 8.15 and 9am and 2.45pm and 3.30pm, sees Hewitts Lane entirely closed between its junctions with Clifton Road and Kett's Avenue.

Previously, the use of cameras to enforce the closures had also been discussed, however, the report states there are "currently no plans or funding available to trial this option".

What is School Streets?

School Streets is a national initiative which is being piloted nationwide by an organisation called Sustrans.

It sees temporary traffic restrictions put in place on selected roads around schools - just a single route in the case of Robert Kett Primary.

The scheme is based on a similar programme that was introduced in Italy in 1989.

However, the initiative did not launch in the UK until 2015, when certain parts of Scotland adopted the approach.

The first place in England to take on the measure was the Camden area of London, which adopted it in 2017.

It is enforced in a variety of ways, with some closures using volunteer marshals while others rely solely on signage and even automatic number plate recognition cameras.

The initiative was pioneered with the aim of creating "safer, healthier and pleasant environments" around schools.

Since its introduction in Camden, it has also been trialled in other parts of the country, including Southampton, Brighton and Oxford.

Three schools in Norfolk - Robert Kett, Dussindale Primary and Browick Road  - began trialling the scheme last year. 

It was also due to be extended to three more - St Augustine's Catholic Primary in Costessey, Nelson Infant and Wensum Junior in Norwich - by viability difficulties got in the way.