How do you spell relief? S-C-H-O-O-L B-U-S! Well, at least for parents and caregivers.
As summer fun has been on the minds of the students, safety and routing have been on the front lines of the Bradford Area School District’s Transportation Office.
Barry Bryan, director, stated, “Every summer we revisit our routes making corrections for graduations, address changes and efficiencies.”
He explained how the routing process works throughout the summer, “With the start of a new school year fast approaching, the transportation office is in full swing. We make the best use of our thirty-bus fleet by operating a two-tier routing system. This refers to running every route twice. Once for secondary students and again for elementary students. To keep the routes evenly loaded, most of our routes begin in the rural sections of our district and work their way into town. Routing buses in our district is especially challenging due to our hill and valley geography. To reach every student we make 27 turnarounds on dead-end hollows every day.”
He has a request to all parents and caregivers with children in the district who ride the school buses. It seems that every year, on the first day of school, there are kids who have moved and the bus garage doesn’t have a new address on file to get them home.
Bryan stated, “All our efforts in routing, however, are only as good as the student address information we have in our records. It is essential that parents contact us well before school starts with address changes or requests for second stops.”
There is a lot of work that goes into creating the bus routes that get students to and from area schools on time.
“Making changes to bus stops takes time and often requires rerouting. Unfortunately, it is not unusual for our office to take in hundreds of requests for changes just days prior to school starting,” said Bryan, then added that all address changes and second stop requests for the beginning of the school year must be received at least three business days prior to the first day of school. “Information is on the district website, and we must have all requests by Friday, Aug. 19 in order to have students on the correct buses going to the right addresses,” said Bryan.
Safety is another concern in the district when it comes to students and school buses.
Bryan explained, “At the top of our priorities is the safety of our bus stops. We scrutinize each stop for blind spots, dangerous berms and traffic conditions. When possible, we make curbside stops so that students do not have to cross the road to board the bus. Try as we may, even the safest bus stop is at the mercy of traffic and drivers around it.”
Everyone in the community is responsible, in one way or another, for the students’ safety. Other drivers must be aware of who else is on the road and hazards, seen and unseen, while driving. Remember the rules when approaching a stopped school bus. When a school bus has its flashing light on and the Stop indicator sign out,
Stopping for a school bus means to stop fully until the driver has turned off the red lights and retracted their Stop signal sign, and begins moving the bus again. This happens when students are getting on and off the bus. And, yes, younger students need assistance and take a little longer to climb the steps. Don’t rush this action. Nothing is more important on a schedule than keeping a child from being struck by a reckless driver.
“Unfortunately, reckless drivers run our school bus red lights on a regular basis. Some of this is due to a misunderstanding about when a driver is required to stop for a school bus,” said Bryan.
But it is not just other drivers. Bryan also said, “Parents can help us keep our students safe by instructing their children not to cross the road until the bus driver gives them a hand motion signaling that it is safe to cross and by reporting any driver that illegally passes the bus.”
Not all children know how to cross the street yet. Parents and children of all ages can work on these skills together. Walk only on the sidewalk when one is available, follow all traffic law (Stop signs and red lights at intersections mean stop for pedestrians as well as drivers), cross only in crosswalks (it might take a few more steps, but it could save a life), look for vehicles (left, right, and left again) before crossing the road, and put cell phones away to reduce distractions.
The National Safety Council offers the following tips and precautions for back-to-school bus safety for everyone.
At the Bus Stop:
Around the Bus
Getting On/Off the Bus
Behavior on the Bus:
