Kids & Public Transit

[ChetMC]

At what age did you (or would you) let your child take public transit without an adult?

Where I live the city will give out city bus passes to kids in grade four. Not all schools, but I know that they do it for the performing and visual arts school. I believe that in Toronto they start giving city transit passes to some kids in grade six instead of having a school bus for them.

The age cutoff is October 1st in Montreal. Kids in grade 4 are nine and the oldest ones will turn ten in October. In Toronto the cutoff is later. Kids in grade 6 could be ten at the start of year and might not turn eleven until Christmas.

If you think it depends on the kid, or the route, what criteria would be necessary for you to let your child use transit alone?

[Lisa1970]

I grew up in a city in Iowa and took the city bus all the time once they started the bus system. I was 9 at the time. I took it downtown to take gymnastics.

If I lived in a busy city, I would have them wait until older. In fact, I don't think I would let my 9 yr old ride the city bus alone even if I lived back in Iowa.

[nicky85]

I took the bus all the time as a kid because we often had only one car. I think I started taking buses by myself at about 9 or maybe 10.

[choli]

9 is fine for bus trips that don't involve a transfer. I would accompany my DD a couple of times until she felt comfortable with it. After she became very comfortable with using the bus, we moved up to trips involving transferring to another bus at the same stop, then another bus at a different stop.

I consider the use of public transport to be an important life skill, so we take care to teach it as we would any other important skill.

[lyterae]

My daughter takes the county transit from preschool to daycare three days a week. It is a specific route(directly from preschool to daycare) and it's only preschoolers.

[Areia]

I started taking the bus and subway alone when I was around 8 or 9 years old.

[Joyster]

I remember myself taking public transit alone when I was about ten. I was a streetcar ride away from my mother's work during rush hour and would go down to meet her. We lived downtown, so it was a busy route, going to Eaton Centre, which is a pretty busy place.

I think it would depend on the route, how street savvy my child was, the hours and of course maturity.

[cyncyn]

Dd is 7 and not ready yet but I hope around 9 or 10 she will be. We have 1 car and a scooter so we use transit quite a bit. This year I have to pay for aftercare because I can't pick her up right after school. Her school is a bus and a train (1-3 stops) away from our house and also from my work. When she can take transit, she can come right to my job after school, or to music lessons or to the library, a friends house etc.

Our a.m. bus is very quiet and we get on at the very beginning, so plenty of seats. After school, she would have to transfer from the train to the bus at a busy transit center, where 3 different bus routes stop. It is a rowdy city bus full of high school kids (we hear a lot of profanity on that route!) and frequently full to standing. Also, there are a couple busy streets to cross where drivers turn right against the light, lots of looking required, even for adults. Plus the schedule is tight for catching the train in time to catch the bus IYKWIM. If it weren't such a difficult route I would consider it at a younger age, maybe 8. Also depends on personality and physical ability to carry and keep track of coat, bag etc.

[Mama2mc]

DS is a toddler, but because of the increasing danger and violence in this city, I don't see myself letting him take public transit without an adult till he's well into his teens , unless we move to a safer place...

[LROM]

We moved to New York City when I was 10, and my commute to 5th grade involved 3 different buses each way. My mom rode with me to school every day for the 1st month, and met me to ride home every day for the 1st 2 weeks. I guess after that she felt ok with me doing it on my own, and I did. And I never had any problem then or later when my commute got even more complicated (I was older).

That said, I agree that it really depends on several factors. What is the route, as a parent are you comfy with the riders you see on that route at the time your child would be going (in general - I know it's not the same people every single day), how does your child feel about doing it, does your child know what to do in certain predictable negative situations (like unwanted attention or someone following them or crazy people on the bus even if they aren't focused on your child, etc). And what is your child maturity level at the time you're considering it? I know some 16 yr olds that I wish were supervised to and from school! And I know some 10 yr olds who are more than able to handle themselves. So it can vary.

One thing my mom doesn't know, which makes me wary of my kid on public transport, is that I decided a good way to get to know NYC was to take the 1st bus from school, but at the transfer point to the 2nd bus (where many bus lines converged), I'd pick a random bus I knew nothing about, purposefully ride it for 30 minutes or so and purposefully NOT pay attention to where it was going, and then get off and figure out where I was on the map and how to get home from wherever I was. Clearly NOT something she'd ever be ok with if she knew, but i never mentioned it. And I never had a problem, and always found my way home, and did learn the city that way! But obviously it COULD have gone very wrong and I would never ever ever knowingly allow my child to do that, even in a smaller city.

[lilyka]

By 10 I would let them take rides that did not involve a transfer. And then once they had done that for a while (six months or so) I would let them transfer as well. It also depends on how often a bus comes by. Here if you miss your bus or need a connection you could be waiting an hour. So screwed. In bigger cities though they apologized if I had to wait more than 10 minutes.

[meemee]

my dd is in 3rd grade. i cant imagine her to be ready to take public transit next year. i know a couple of kids have been taking public transit since 4th grade.

i am not so concerned about 'dangers'. i live in a big city.

its more about dd's confidence. and her ability to react if she got on the wrong bus or missed it or if it broke down what she would do.

if she shows me those abilities and wants to take the bus by herself i will allow her even at 4th grade. i wish there were a few of the kids taking buses. if there was a group of kids going to school together on public tranist then i would allow dd to go now in 3rd grade. i know with other friends she would have (in fact if i hadnt moved she would be going with her 6th grade friend on public transit)

[cyncyn]

Originally Posted by meemee

my dd is in 3rd grade. i cant imagine her to be ready to take public transit next year. i know a couple of kids have been taking public transit since 4th grade.

i am not so concerned about 'dangers'. i live in a big city.

its more about dd's confidence. and her ability to react if she got on the wrong bus or missed it or if it broke down what she would do.

if she shows me those abilities and wants to take the bus by herself i will allow her even at 4th grade. i wish there were a few of the kids taking buses. if there was a group of kids going to school together on public tranist then i would allow dd to go now in 3rd grade. i know with other friends she would have (in fact if i hadnt moved she would be going with her 6th grade friend on public transit)

I am hoping to find an older student at my dd's school (it's K-12) who would be taking the same transit route and make sure dd got transferred over and off at the right stops. And be there as a backup in case of unusual circumstances. A group of kids together would be better than one kid alone.

[Kyamo]

I think I was around 12 when I started taking transit downtown with friends for occasional day trips - we lived out in the suburbs so this was about 1 hr 15 mins trip with 1 bus, 1 RT train and 2 subways. It was totally fine as a group, but I don't think I would have felt comfortable doing it alone at that age without my friends. But a routine short trip to school would be different.

Originally Posted by meemee

i am not so concerned about 'dangers'. i live in a big city.

its more about dd's confidence. and her ability to react if she got on the wrong bus or missed it or if it broke down what she would do.

Originally Posted by choli

I consider the use of public transport to be an important life skill, so we take care to teach it as we would any other important skill.

Originally Posted by ChetMC

I believe that in Toronto they start giving city transit passes to some kids in grade six instead of having a school bus for them.

It's just for students who are out of the area for the school, and over a certain number of km away from the school, not for every student instead of having any buses. They also give them tickets, not passes, and deduct from the number of tickets for absent days (high school students will skip school and then complain about not getting the bus tickets... lol). I'm not sure what age it starts, I have only seen it in high schools.

[pumpkin]

Our current public transit is practically nonexistent. In our old city I had several bad experiences that caused me to start a personal policy of only taking the bus if I could walk if needed. So i might catch the bus if it meant not walking home in the rain, but I would not take it across town. I didn't want to get stuck waiting at a stop with some crazy person threatening me because leaving the stop would mean getting stranded. I think we will have a similar rule for DD and she will have to be pretty old. I've just really been scared off being dependent on group transit.
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[34me]

We live in a college town of about 130,000 not counting students. DD rode the bus requiring 2 transfers the summer she was 12 so she could go to a summer orchestra program. I rode it once with her the week before. The bus drivers pretty much are always the same so they got familiar with her.

[eclipse]

I live in a large city in Mexico. My answer is pretty much never, while we're living here. I think I was about 11 the first time I took the city bus by myself in San Diego.

[CrazyCatLady]

I was taking the bus around our town in 7th grade. By 9th grade I was transferring buses and able to get anywhere in southern CA with little trouble. On days off of school we'd often take the bus down to the beach and hang out (it was actually four buses and an hours worth of travel time). I probably would have been fine riding the bus alone even younger, it just didn't come up.

So my answer I guess is around 11ish depending on the kid, the city, etc. Probably much younger if it were just a short/easy trip to school and back.

We took school buses alone from age 6, and even that included walking to the stop, knowing which bus to get one, etc. Kids are pretty darn capable when they need to be.

[Smithie]

Until my children have height and size and defensive skillset giving them a reasonable chance to fight off a physical attack from a mentally ill adult, they will not ride public transportation alone. I rode SEPTA almost every day for two years straight in Philly, and it boggles my mind that a nine or ten year old would be left to cope with that situation solo.

[shnitzel]

Growing up in Toronto I didn't take public transit until High School, probably not until Grade 10 so around the age of 14 and never downtown alone until I started college. But I think my parents were rather overprotective.

I now live in NYC and if we stay here I would likely allow it at 12 or 13 depending on the child.