A national push to see children and young people swap the school bus for the walking shoes every morning has been criticised in the Riverina for failing to take a whole-country approach to safety.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
In the Riverina, where many students attend schools in the next town district, it is neither practical nor safe to walk, parents say.
For those who do live within walking distance, local infrastructure can become another barrier.
Such is the situation for Cindy Earle's two sons, who attend the Lutheran Primary School in Tatton.
"We do live close enough to walk, but it's just not safe," Ms Earle said.
"They'd have to cross Red Hill Road, where there's a roundabout and cars coming past at 70km/h. There's no crossings, there's nowhere safe they could get across."
A general poll of her neighbours and other local school mums reveal a similar sentiment.
"I think parents would be more willing to let their kids walk or ride to school if they knew they'd be safe," Ms Earle said.
The national push glides off the back of a report released to coincide with the annual Walk To School day last Friday.
Across the region, and particularly in the smaller towns, schools organised safe group journeys through the school gates.
The national research found, less than 20 per cent of children in the country are completing even the minimum level of exercise each day.
Academics from the University of South Australia have built a springboard campaign to make walking to school the norm.
Head researcher Professor Tim Olds has spoken of the importance of raising young people's 'incidental activity'.
"When it comes to everyday activities, walking or riding to school is a big-ticket item," Professor Olds said.
"But even the simple act of walking to school has been declining at a rate of about 2 to 3 per cent a year for the past 20 years or so."
While a practical solution to children's inactivity in the cities might be the encouragement to walk to school each day, Wagga Road Runners veteran Malcolm Edgars believes there are other more appropriate solutions in the country.
"There's so much going on in Wagga for people to get involved in and get active with," he said.
"Here, the [driving] distances aren't overwhelming, so a lot of families are able to participate in two or three sports on a Saturday. In Sydney, you'd spend the whole day just driving to one game."
Mr Edgars believes Wagga and the Riverina have benefitted from their historic prominence as the birthplace of sporting greats, which has proved enough inspiration to keep generations of children active.
"They're the kind of people who we as a community can take our hats off to," he said.
"They keep us motivated, I think."
Mrs Earle's two sons and their contemporaries may well be bucking the national activity trend as a result.
Both regular attendees of the Saturday morning park runs, both the seven- and nine-year-old lead incredibly active lives. Their inability to walk to school has not diminished their enthusiasm for fitness.
"My kids are very active, and their friends group also seem to be too," Mrs Earle said.
"They always seem to be getting off to training of one sort or another. It's hard for me to say whether the city as a whole is active, but definitely in my own life, my sons and my husband and I are."