Car exclusion zones should be set up around schools to help tackle obesity and climate change, a report suggested today.
The Institute for European Environmental Policy (IEEP) research found that banning vehicles from roads near schools could help reverse the dramatic decline in walking seen in the UK in recent decades. Leaving the car at home would benefit children and their parents, it said.
Taking children to school, especially at primary level, could usually be carried out on foot, the institute said.
In 1989, adults drove an average of 55 miles for the school run, but that increased to 82 miles by 2005.
The report, Unfit for Purpose (pdf), warned that reducing car use would be a large-scale effort costing millions of pounds, but a first step could be banning cars from schools or local shops and other facilities where people routinely drive.
Currently 38% of all journeys of less than two miles are taken by car, but they could be covered by up to 30 minutes' brisk walking.
If a typical British adult were to walk for just one hour more a week - returning to the average walked by people without cars - it would prevent them gaining two stones over a decade and make a major contribution to halting the obesity crisis.
The extra walking could reduce CO2 emissions from cars by 11m tonnes, or 15.4%, the research found. The effort would be cheaper than dealing with the cost to the NHS and society of the obesity crisis and climate change, the report said.
Britain has one of the fastest growing rates of obesity in the world, with more than 23.6% of men and 23.8% of women having a body mass index (BMI) of 30 or more in 2006.
Rise of car ownership since the early 1960s has been matched by a decline in walking and cycling.
In 2005, more than a fifth of all CO2 emitted in the UK came from trucks and cars, while passenger cars accounted for 13% of the UK's carbon emissions in 2003.
The report's lead author, Dr Adrian Davis, said: "The substitution of car use for walking is a major contributor to the steep rise in obesity, as walking is the most obvious way for most people to burn calories.
"A small daily reduction in walking over a decade or more has a profound and damaging impact on body weight."
Carolina Valsecchi, from the IEEP, said: "The twin crises of obesity and climate change are clearly interlinked through the switch from muscle power to engine power for transport. Concerted action is needed to reverse both these trends.
"Our research demonstrates that something as simple as walking short trips now made by car would make an important contribution to tackling obesity and climate change."
The institute hopes to encourage ministers to promote more walking and is calling for towns and cities to be made more pedestrian-friendly, implementing measures such as widening pavements and improving street lighting.
