Home zone

A home zone is a living street (or group of streets) as implemented in the United Kingdom, which are designed primarily to meet the needs of pedestrians, cyclists, children and residents and where the speeds and dominance of the cars is reduced.

Legislation was introduced by the Highway Act 1835 which banned the playing of football and games on the highway with a maximum penalty of up to forty shillings (£177.62 as of 2015). In 1860 Taverner John Miller, MP for Colchester reported to the House of Commons that in the previous year 44 children had been sent to prison in London and Middlesex for failure to pay fines for playing in the street, highlighting the case of a 12-year-old boy sent to prison for 5 days for playing rounders. In 1925 Nancy Astor MP noted in the Commons that "There is no more pitiable sight in life than a child which has been arrested for playing in the street". By 1935 over 2,000 young people under the age of seventeen are prosecuted for playing in the streets.

In 1934 Leslie Hore-Belisha became Transport Minister and initiated a number of road safety schemes in response the rising number of Road Casualties in Great Britain; these included the zebra crossing and a proposal to introduce play streets to the UK, which had been successfully operating in the USA. Following a trial of 200 Play Streets in Manchester and Salford from 1936, the Street Playground Act 1938 allowed councils to designate streets as playgrounds where games could be played.

In 1957 the Transport Minister was asked in the Commons if he was aware that playground streets regulations were being ignored and were frequently used by through traffic; the Minister responded saying that the size of Playground Streets signs had recently been increased in size to make them more prominent. Play street legislation was included in section 49 of the Road Traffic Act 1960.

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