School buses vs public buses

[MasterSpenny]

One thing I have been able to compare when it comes to school to regular buses today is that the school routes have a lot more pressure on running it. For example, there is a risk that you can get in late to school. As a school student, I have been through this and I personally see temporary traffic lights are just too bad and time consuming (this happened today).

On regular buses, students relying on them is kind of inconvenient to the regular people as they will just fill it up to the brim. In addition I have seen this happen multiple times before.

 

[318266]

As someone who has highly critiqued my independent school's somewhat interesting homemade timetables (timed for 60 in a 30). 2 are contracted to McGill's and 1 to Clarke's (formerly 2 Gibson's and 1 Coast-to-Coast, the former shut down unexpectedly and the latter was swapped for a cheaper operator), services aren't registered and members of the public are clearly banned. Same follows for all of state and independent schools in my area, except some of the vehicles on the state side might be a good 20 years older. The only registered, public runs are diversions of the 533 to serve Newark Primary School - open to the public, although the morning run runs 6 mins behind a different 533 so you'd be hardpressed to find a reason to use it!

 

[markymark2000]

One thing I have been able to compare when it comes to school to regular buses today is that the school routes have a lot more pressure on running it. For example, there is a risk that you can get in late to school. As a school student, I have been through this and I personally see temporary traffic lights are just too bad and time consuming (this happened today).

The big difference here can be 'a normal local bus route which just so happens to be used by school kids' and 'council pays for seats on a local bus route'. The latter has just as much pressure to run it because there are penalties in place for not running it. This style of working also means that there is generally more capacity too as the council may ask for 50 seats say, a double decker is put on which means at least 30 seats for school kids who need to pay (if there is any demand for that, it depends on the councils policy on free school transport) and normal members of the public.

On regular buses, students relying on them is kind of inconvenient to the regular people as they will just fill it up to the brim. In addition I have seen this happen multiple times before.

Again, this depends on the style of service but also depends on the operator. Professional operators will ensure that there are enough seats for everyone. Unprofessional operators and those who are just dying for an extra few ££ in their back pocket will not care and will want the bus at it's legal capacity (which for some deckers is 100), and not care for passenger comfort.

It's all down to who runs the service really and what, if any, contracts they have with the council for conveying students. I have a Stagecoach route in my area using normal Scania E400s, standard Stagecoach spec vehicles, there are 67 spaces paid for by the council and the capacity of the bus is around 80 so based off everyone having a seat, that is 13 seats for the public. In reality of course some kids choose to stand, I am not sure if the capacity on Bus lists on the web included tip up seats which could give more capacity. There's a few other variables. Either way, based off them numbers, there is enough capacity for both normal people and school kids. I know, and have seen some less reputable companies shall we say running though on routes which carry 100 kids on a 80 seater bus. All varies. There's good and bad examples.

 

[lxfe_mxtterz]

At one stage, regular hourly routes used to take school traffic. Often they would run a little earlier or later to co-incide with the school opening and closing times, and would divert off the regular route to serve the schools.

On some routes a couple of regular hourly journeys would do this, to serve different schools with different going-home times.

So regular users on those journeys would have no choice but to share the bus with the school pupils. Generally however, double deckers would be used for such journeys when single deckers were the norm - which could lead to some interesting vehicle working patterns to accommodate this.

Does this practice still occur? Haven't seen it for a while.

This certainly still occurs on the Falcon Buses (formerly Stagecoach) route 715 between Guildford and Kingston - a broadly hourly service but with timing alterations and diversions to serve Esher High School.

The low bridge on the route precludes the use of double deckers, however. In my experience, the school-diverted 07:05 from Guildford gets absolutely crush loaded with school kids between Cobham and Esher. A downright unpleasant experience and I would often leave earlier and catch the 06:20 if I had to be in Kingston before 09:00.

 

[Martin2012]

From the new year the Y6 (Chipping Sodbury to Southmead) is having one journey each way rerouted to serve Winterbourne International Academy, replacing a dedicated school bus service (460) which is being withdrawn. Anyone know what the rationale behind this decision is?

 

[swifty]

From the new year the Y6 (Chipping Sodbury to Southmead) is having one journey each way rerouted to serve Winterbourne International Academy, replacing a dedicated school bus service (460) which is being withdrawn. Anyone know what the rationale behind this decision is?

Presumably, because the Y6 follows the same route (minus serving the bus park at The Ridings) as the 460. And the fact that both Stagecoach and Transpora have previously cut back services for The Ridings, meaning the bus operating the 460 also has to run the 459 before (AM) and 427 after (PM) with sub optimal arrival and departure times to accommodate.

 

[Zamracene749]

Safeguarding of the schoolkids? Around many areas local to me, it's the poor unwary punter that needs protecting FROM the kids! I'd sooner eat my own feet than get on a school service in most parts of Tyneside, Durham and Cleveland!

 

[johncrossley]

London is a prime example of why having school pupils relying on regular service buses to get to and from school is a bad idea. Although there are a number of dedicated school routes, this is only where there is no duplicate regular service. The result is that in some areas other passengers have no chance of getting on a bus at school finishing time as they’re rammed full of kids. The 61 and 320 in the Bromley area are a couple of examples, although I’m talking 5 or so years back so not sure if things have improved. I think if you are to do this, you need to have extra journeys on the regular services at school times.

In a lot of cases (maybe most), kids come from a wide variety of destinations across that part of London, meaning they need to change onto another bus. And on those other buses there may well be kids from other schools as well. So dedicated buses (in general) for schools aren't really practical as traffic patterns are too diffuse. People who use London buses regularly will know that overcrowding can occur throughout the day and not just at school times.