As most pupil transportation professionals know, fewer than 10 or 15 students (depending on the state) may be transported in non-yellow buses – buses considerably less costly, particularly those of the smallest, stock ambulatory vans and minivans that don’t even require a “conversion process.” However, other than in Massachusetts (that I know of), such buses are not allowed to contain crossing equipment. As a consequence, the crossing safety of their passengers depends upon their be picked up or dropped off on the same side of the street as their homes or schools.
Depending on the pickup or drop-off area and its constraints, the need for same-side pickups and drop-offs can present challenges:
Late one evening, returning two elementary school students from an after-school program, the non CDL-licensed driver of a 16-passenger, non-yellow schoolbus was faced with a dilemma: Parking was allowed along on the side of the 30-foot-wide, two-way street on which the passengers lived. But the phalanx of cars parked bumper-to-bumper on that side allowed no opportunity for the driver to squeeze in and pull to the curb, and he was instead faced with the choice of either double-parking to discharge them (which he should have done) or parking across from their home – a side of the street marked with a “no-standing” sign. Choosing the latter, the driver – who normally discharged them on the side where they lived or escorted them across (when their older sister did not meet the van and do so) – instead chatted with the older boy while, growing impatient, his seven-year-old sister who had exited the van minutes earlier finally decided to cross by herself – and was struck by a car passing the van. Without the conspicuity and equipment of a yellow schoolbus, this collision was predictable – or in legal parlance, reasonably foreseeable. The student was severely injured.
From my decade in paratransit service transporting developmentally-disabled passengers of all but school age, and deploying a non-yellow bus fleet, I am sensitive to the scheduling challenges of arranging same-side pickups and drop-offs or the unwavering need for drivers to physically escort passengers across the roadway when they cannot pick up or drop off on the “same side.” This challenge is far worse for paratransit systems where the ridership patterns vary considerably from day to day – whereas my vehicles’ schedules varied only slightly. Just the same, our “demand-responsive” vehicles did not follow specific paths, and our drivers often modified them somewhat from day to day (we deliberately rotated drivers among assignments to familiarize them with the service area in general rather than with only a tiny slice of it).
Realistically, the cost of yellow schoolbuses may seem prohibitive in some situations – often ironically because certain schoolbus requirements like FMVSS #220 (rollover protection) add weight to the vehicle while, at the same time, raise its center-of-gravity – in the process increasing the likelihood of a rollover actually occurring. Other cost differences are exaggerated by the “conversion process” (adding crossing equipment, emergency exits and other schoolbus requirements) and the considerable profits siphoned off by the limited number of each OEMs’ or converters’ dealerships (compared to the tens of thousands of automobile OEMs that dot the landscape, often in fierce competition with one another). But the responsibilities for operating “non-crossing buses” are far more critical when it comes to crossing. Given the often challenging constraints of the operating environment, and the nature of our litigious society, it may be cheaper to purchase and deploy a genuine schoolbus, even in cases when their passenger capacity doesn’t require one. Private schools, child transport providers and similar institutions should think twice about transporting students in anything else.