What do these road markings outside a school mean?

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Inconsiderate parking by parents taking and collecting their children from school is a common and pretty complicated problem. Parents seldom leave or go far from their vehicle, thus traditional parking regulations may have little or no effect.

The goal of placing School Keep Clear markings is to keep the area outside of schools clear of parked vehicles so that children may be seen more clearly when crossing the street.

School Keep Clear markings were first prescribed in the 1964 Traffic Signs Regulations. They were made up of broken white lines making a box with the words "School Entrance" at the time. School Keep Clear  The Traffic Signs Regulations of 1964 were the first to require clear markings. They were made up of broken white lines making a box with the words "School Entrance" at the time.

In 1975, the mandated marking was altered to what we know today: a yellow zig-zag line protruding into the road with the words "School Keep Clear" in between the zig-zags. This has shown to be successful in reducing parking. Since then, the current markings arrangement has been mandated by all Traffic Signs Regulations.

Experiments with mandatory and enforceable restrictions were conducted in the old London GLC areas from 1975 to 1978, in Nottingham from 1980 to 1981, and in the London Borough of Croydon from 1988 to 1989. The subsequent findings, however, revealed that the minority who ignored the warning signs were not deterred by mandatory signing. Regular enforcement is thus required to achieve any improvement. The Police and Bath & North East Somerset Parking Attendants are now in charge of enforcement.

A vehicle parked on School Keep Clears signs is deemed to be causing an obstruction. In practice, though, evidence of obstruction would be required if prosecution was considered. Drivers are warned not to rely on such Highway Code markings.