Abstract
Suburban mothers are a vulnerable group in transport since they experience especially great spatiotemporal constraints due to their gender roles and are facing transport barriers typical for suburban areas. Locations of home, work, and kindergarten are essential factors influencing the everyday travel experience of mothers of preschool children. This paper examines spatial patterns of the home-work-kindergarten spatial separation of mothers (the extent to which a mother’s residence, workplace, and childcare facility are geographically distributed, manifesting in different spatial configurations) along with its causes and circumstances. Together, 136 middle-class mothers residing in the post-socialist Bratislava suburban region (Slovakia) participated in the research. Most mothers preferred and had their children’s kindergartens near their home locations. There was no significant correlation between the gender beliefs of mothers (in areas of work and childcare) and the home-work-kindergarten separation. Mothers primarily responsible for bringing and picking up a child in/from a kindergarten had significantly smaller home-work-kindergarten separation than others. However, when distinguishing the time of the day, such results were only valid for the morning periods. There was no significant difference in the degree of the home-work-kindergarten separation between the mothers who receive help with child care from another adult in their household and others.