I live round the corner from a reception & primary school. The school entrance is on the inside of a loooong radius corner that encircles most of the grounds. The road outside becomes a car park twice daily and if you're tyring to navigate around it, there is literally no way of seeing if your way is clear. I'm not around Mon-Thu to experience it, but on a Friday afternoon I am often treated to the cacophony of idling engines and beeping horns.
The lasting negative effect I see is that the pavements around my area are covered in oily blotches where cars (whose seals are all shot from daily 5 min journeys, no doubt) have been sat waiting for their precious darlings.
There is obviously a toxic element of car culture that means people will use them, despite it being a net inconvenience (justifying the cost, perhaps?), instead of walking/cycling. However, I know of some mitigating circumstances due to other bureaucratic failings that must shoulder some of the blame: Some friends who live around the corner have their kids at the school above, they had go through several appeals to get their kids placed at this school, which is all of 700m from their house, as they were not in the catchment zone for it. By the council's plans, they would have had to take their kids 3 miles away, the other side of the town centre which probably would have meant them buying a second car and driving them there and back.
