School Bus Safety a Concern in District 57
Prince George, B.C. – School bus safety has been flagged again as a concern in the Prince George School District.
The issue was originally raised by Gillian Burnett, treasurer of the Nukko Lake Parent Advisory Council (see original story here) in November, and again during a recent meeting of the Board’s Education Services Committee.
Burnett indicated to the Board in November her PAC had taken safety measures into their own hands by purchasing safety vests for children and installing a sign that indicates a bus stop is coming up.
“We appreciate the efforts of Ms. Burnett and other parents in promoting bus safety,” said trustee Sharel Warrington. “More than 25% of our students ride the bus to and from school on buses that travel 10,200 kilometres each school day,” she said.
According to Board Chairperson Tony Cable, Diversified Transportation (the company providing transportation for children) has advised that there are four areas of the school district of particular concern to them.
They are:
Highway 16 West in Beaverly
Chief Lake Road
College Heights near Southridge Elementary School
Hill Avenue near D.P. Todd Secondary School
Up until the end of January, 2015, Diversified school bus drivers have reported 68 incidents of community drivers passing their buses while stopped with their red lights engaged.
Burnett told the Board in November it has led to some close calls.
“Over the years we’ve had multiple families come in with some really serious concerns and some near misses about their kids trying to get on a bus or get off a bus.”
Warrington says the Board is taking action to address the issue by raising the matter at the next meeting of the Prince George Traffic Safety Committee.
The committee includes representatives of the RCMP, ICBC and the Ministry of Transportation.
Comments
SOME people are just plain stupid, driving in a trance not paying attention or just ignorant enough to pass a school bus risking the chance of killing some poor innocent child.FOR what? JUST TO save maybe 10 seconds out of your day………… THEN having to live with that the rest of your life. GO FIGURE.
Too many soccer mom’s updating their facebook status while driving to school. See it all the time.
Parents of kids I find are the worst offenders for passing school buses with full warning lights and stop sign deployed.
Yet these are after the same people who complain their children are not safe on the roads ….go figure
Well the bus company needs to install dash cams and pass the collected evidence to the RCMP. Good dash cams are cheap per unit and easy to install. Would be nice if community policing stepped up and did ride alongs to forward offenders info to the RCMP for a follow up visit with the driver of the offending vehicle. These issue don’t “self cure” you need to be proactive, try to argue it wasn’t you when you see the video of your stupidity.
This is an industry town and parents should, in concert with the schools, encourage the wearing of visvests when kids are going to and coming from bus stops. Once they are taught to use them, they feel uncomfortable without them. Who cares that it’s not cool, it’s safe and obvious, coming home alive is much more “cool”.
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