The protection of children from traffic dangers during the reorganisation of Oxford schools will be a top priority, the city and county councils have agreed.

Middle schools are being scrapped in the city to create a two-tier education system in line with the rest of the county. The restructuring also affects first schools.

Building work on the programme will start at the end of term, but the new system will not begin until September 2003.

On Friday, June 22, pupils in first, middle and upper schools had a day off while staff attended briefings about the reorganisation. The 'partnership launch day' is being held at four upper school venues in the city.

Pupil numbers will grow at some schools, and city councillors have raised objections to plans at a number of them because they are concerned about an increase in traffic. Then, last Friday, at the city council planning committee, objections were raised to plans for a new nursery and an extension to an existing school because not enough transport information had been provided.

The plans, part of the schools reorganisation, are to expand Hinksey First School, a 150-pupil school with a nursery to take an extra 30 pupils. St John's Church Hall would be demolished to make way for a nursery on the site.

A new two-storey technology block is also being planned for Peers School in Littlemore, which will expand to become a secondary school.

City council planning chairman John Goddard explained that while the county council was able to effectively pass its own planning applications for the school plans, the city council would continue to raise objections, where it saw fit, to try to safeguard pupils.

He said: "There has been an absence of information provided about the extra pupil numbers at certain schools and the effect that will have on traffic.

"We are saying that every school should present a Travel Plan, where there is an emphasis on cycling and walking to school, and where teachers, parents and governors work out the safest way to get to and from school."

John Mitchell, the county council's education spokesman, said: "Pupil safety is always upper-most in our thinking and there is Government guidance about the need to analyse the traffic consequences of any building scheme and we have followed the guidance."