Idling
Tips for School Bus Operation
-from Department of
Public Instruction
View or Download Idling Tips (pdf, 40kb)
TIPS FOR DRIVERS:
- Do not idle your school bus for longer than five (5) minutes to build up air pressure.
- Additional idling does not help the school bus get warmer.
- Do not idle your bus while loading or unloading on school grounds.
- Driver must be within 3 feet of the bus while it is running. No exceptions!
TIPS FOR ADMINISTRATORS:
- Buses should not park on school grounds near building air-intake systems.
- Buses should not park nose to tail when it can be avoided.
INTERNET RESOURCES:
www.nasdpts.org/reports.html
- Air Quality: Suggested Operational Practices for School Buses
www.ncchild.org/diesel8x11.pdf
- N.C.Child Advocacy Institute paper on diesel fumes (pdf
document)
www.epa.gov/cleanschoolbus
- Clean School Bus USA program
February2004
NC School-Related Travel Crash Data Web Site Launched
According to the National Academies’ study on the relative risks of school travel, 800 school-age children are killed in motor vehicle crashes during school travel hours each year. This accounts for 14% of the 5,600 child deaths that occur on the nation's highways. The School Transportation Group set out to research how safe school travel is among 100 North Carolina counties.
Using data from the North Carolina Department of Transportation Division of Motor Vehicles, Traffic Records Section, the School Transportation Group developed a Web site that allows users to query school-related crashes by county.
The following criteria were used for the data analysis:
PASSENGER VEHICLES:
Passenger Car, Pickup, Light Truck, SUV, Van
SCHOOL BUSES: School Bus
OTHER BUSES: Commercial Bus, Activity Bus, Other Bus
PEDESTRIANS/BICYCLISTS: Bicycle, Pedestrian
TIME OF CRASH (Normal
school transportation hours):
• 6:00 a.m. to 8:59 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. to 4:59 p.m.
• Monday through Friday
• September 1st through June 15th
• Excluding major holidays
November
3, 2003
The True Costs and Risks of School Transportation
A presentation was made by Jeff Tsai during the Association of School Business Officers in Charlotte, N.C. on the topic of "The True Costs and Risks of School Transportation". The presentation has been converted to pdf for download and review.
Download
pdf presentation (1.23 MB)
October
9, 2003
International Walk to School Day a Success for Apex School
ITRE director participates using TIMS software
Apex, N.C. – Olive Chapel Elementary School children and their parents joined more than 30 other countries by happily trekking to school on Wednesday, October 8th for International Walk to School Day. Olive Chapel Elementary School has been the site of a project beingconducted by UNC-Chapel Hill School of Public Health to increase active travel to school. Many of the 4th and 5th grade students have been wearing activity monitors to measure their level of daily movement and International Walk to School Day was the perfect opportunity to put this study to the test. International Walk to School Day began in 1994 in Great Britain and has since spread to include over 3 million participants. The goals of Walk to School Day are to encourage physical fitness, raise awareness of the value of walkable communities, raise concern for the environment, reduce crime and take back neighborhoods, and reduce traffic congestion, pollution, and speed near schools.
This event was more
than a mere walk to school for Jeff Tsai, Director of Pupil and School
Transportation at The Institute for Transportation Research and Education
(ITRE). He participated as a parent and a researcher. Tsai used a
Transportation Information Management System (TIMS) to create “walking
school bus” routes in order to establish staging locations and set
times participants should start walking. TIMS is a computer program ITRE
normally uses to map school bus routes, but could be used in the future
to route “walking school buses”, a walk to school system popular
in New Zealand and Europe, where an adult “driver” meets children
at specific “bus stops” to safely walk to school together. School
carpool traffic was also measured -- on a regular school day, there are
over 200 vehicles maneuvering the carpool lanes; during Walk to School
Day there were only around 70 cars.
Over 400 Olive Chapel
students walked to school out of an enrollment population of 900. NC State
House Representative Paul Stam joined the walkers as well as Don Nail,
Director of NC Governor's Highway Safety Program, Department of Public
Instruction Director of School
Services, Dr. Ben Matthews, and Apex town manager Bruce Radford. Police
officers were stationed at key points along the routes to direct walkers.
In addition, Buster, a remote controlled talking school bus, greeted children
as they entered campus.
To learn more about TIMS software, visit www.ncbussafety.org/routing.html or to learn more about the research of Pupil and School Transportation, visit www.itre.ncsu.edu/stg. Both Web sites are designed and maintained by ITRE.
Download Press Release (pdf, 44 kb)
A portion of this
news release was used in an article run in the Cary News on 10-16-03.
October
2003
Travel and Environmental Implications
of School Siting
New study evaluates the relationship between school location, travel choices and the environment
"Travel and Environmental Implications of School Siting," released by the EPA on October 8, 2003, is the first study to empirically examine the relationship between school locations, the built environment around schools, how kids get to school, and the impact on air emissions of those travel choices. Over the next few decades, communities making decisions about the construction and renovation of thousands of schools will be challenged to meet multiple goals - educational, fiscal, and environmental.
The study finds that:
- School proximity to students matters. Students with shorter walk and bike times to school are more likely to walk or bike.
- The built environment influences travel choices. Students traveling through pedestrian-friendly environments are more likely to walk or bike.
- Because of travel behavior differences, school location has an impact on air emissions. Centrally located schools that can be reached by walking and bicycling result in reduced air emissions from driving.
- More data collection and research are needed to add further to the understanding of these effects. Specifically, improved data about both school travel and the built environment as well as new modeling techniques can build on these results.
For some time, there has been a trend toward construction of big schools and requirements for large sites. Guidelines, recommendations, and standards that encourage or require building large schools on new campuses or discourage renovation are embedded in a variety of state and local regulations, laws and funding formulas. This study provides important information about the effect of school location on how children get to school. It shows that school siting and design can affect choices of walking, biking, or driving. In turn, these changes in travel choices could affect traffic congestion, air pollution, and school transportation budgets.
To request copies of this report, call EPA's National Service Center for Environmental Publications at (513) 891- 6561 and ask for publication number EPA 231-R-03-004.
Read the report online: http://www.epa.gov/smartgrowth/pdf/school_travel.pdf (pdf, 1.3MB)
Presentations from the 2003 School Transportation News EXPO
Two presentations
were made during the 2003 School Transportation News EXPO in
Reno, NV. The presentations have been converted to pdf for download and
review.
Download pdf presentation:
GIS-GPS-AVL (1.27
MB)
"Global Positioning System, Automated Vehicle Location, Geographic
Information System and Routing/Scheduling System"
Download presentation:
Paradigms (2.85
MB)
"New Paradigm for School Transportation"
Carpool Decision Tree - Carpool Recommendations
The carpool decsion tree is a web-based suport tool to be used by school staff to analyze and find recommendations on ways to improve carpool traffic.
Run Decision Tree Web-based support tool
School Campus Carpool Facts
- In an average, more than 60% of parents arrived in the carpool lane sitting idle before the afternoon school bell time. Their average time spent in the carpool was triple the amount of those who joined the carpool lane shortly after the afternoon bell time.
- The actual loading and unloading of students in an efficiently managed loading area should take less than 10 seconds per vehicle. The complete process of a single vehicle entering the loading area, loading/unloading passengers, then exiting the loading area should be completed in less than 45 seconds.
- Limiting options for parents, such as restricting access to certain parking areas and enforcing no parking zone during the carpool hour, reduces circumventions that may lead to vehicle-to-pedestrian and vehicle-to-vehicle crashes.
- Schools with large walker populations should stagger release times to separate walkers from carpool traffic. The walkers should be released first to provide sufficient time before the carpool process begins. Schools should also consider implementing walking program such as Walking School Bus as a means to mitigate carpool traffic.
- If overflow of cars onto adjacent roadways is a problem at a school, then implementing a double queuing lane at some point in the carpool lane is a viable solution. This would require a supervisor to enforce, at least when first being implemented at a school, but would result in reducing overflow and providing more storage capacity.
- According to a recent national study, about 800 school-age children are killed every year in motor vehicle crashes during normal school travel hours — weekday mornings and afternoons during school months. Of these 800 deaths, only about 2 percent are school-bus related, while 74 percent occur in private passenger vehicles and 22 percent are the result of pedestrian or bicycle accidents. More than half of all deaths of children between age 5 and 18 occur during normal school travel hours when a teen-ager is driving. Click here for more information.
- For schools experiencing tremendous traffic congestion or having safety concerns, technical assistance is available from NCDOT's Municipal and School Transportation Assistance. Please call Joel Cranford at (919) 250-4151.
View
Best Practices Managing School Carpool Traffic Schematic
Run Decision Tree Anaysis
to Determine Ways to Improve Carpool Traffic
View Project Status
Greatest Risk in School Travel is Not on School Buses
Every year, about 800 school-age children are killed in motor vehicle crashes during school travel hours, accounts for 14% of 5,600 child deaths that occur in nation's highways. According to recent study from the National Academies' Transportation Research Board, school children are at far more risk traveling to and from school in private passenger vehicles than in school buses. Of these 800 deaths, 74 percent occur in private passenger vehicles and 22 percent are the result of pedestrian or bicycle accidents.
View
the National Academies of Science Press Release
View the complete
report
Where Does North Carolina Stand in School Travel Safety?
Now the National Research Council's report is out, where does North Carolina stand in school travel safety? Using identical data and query parameters as the National Academies of Science's study, between 1994-1995 to 1999-2000 school years, North Carolina rankings are as following:
- Private Vehicles
- 5th in the nation in school age fatalities
- 4th in the nation in fatalities, incapacitated injuries and non-incapacitated injuries combined
- 7th in the nation in school age fatality rate when compared nationwide using fall 2000 public school enrollment
- 7th in the nation in school age fatalities, incapacitated injuries and non-incapacitated injuries combined rate when compared nationwide using fall 2000 public school enrollment
- Pedestrian
- 7th in the nation in school age fatalities
- 7th in the nation in fatalities, incapacitated injuries and non-incapacitated injuries combined
- 4th in the nation in school age fatality rate when compared nationwide using fall 2000 public school enrollment
- 6th in the
nation in school age fatalities, incapacitated injuries and non-incapacitated
injuries combined rate when compared nationwide using fall
2000 public school enrollment
STG Completes Analysis on North Carolina School Walk Zone
Funded by the North Carolina Department of Transportation, Division of Bicycle and Pedestrian Transportation, The School Transportation Group completed an analysis of guidelines and criteria for establishing school walk zones among North Carolina public schools. The result of the survey reveal that North Carolina public schools do not have guidelines for establishing school walk zone and has not established definition for walk zone. It is estimated there are 33 crashes per year involving school age children walking to school who live within the district defined "Walk-Zone" with 1 fatality every other year.
Survey
Shows Parents Misjudge Risk of Driving to School
The March
2002 issue of the School
Transportation News featured an article on research conducted by Tori
Rhoulac, a doctoral candidate in civil engineering who has worked at the
Institute for Transportation Research and Education (ITRE) in the Pupil
Transportation Group since August 1999. The article reports that Wake
County parents miscalculate the danger their children face while being
transported to school, rating the family car as safer than the school
bus.
The research, funded through The School Transportation Group at ITRE, involved a survey of parents and quoted statistics from the NHTSA's Fatality Analysis Reporting System to indicate parental misconceptions about their child's safety during the daily commute to and from school.
View
the complete PowerPoint presentation in pdf format to read more about
the details and conclusion of the study.
Welcome Nina Szlosberg: New addition to the Advisory Committee
ITRE is pleased to announce that Nina Szlosberg, President of NAPRO Communications, a Raleigh media production and consulting firm, has agreed to serve on the School Transportation Group’s Advisory Board. She replaces the retiring NC State Professor Ray Taylor.
Ms. Szlosberg brings
many different perspectives to the Advisory Board. She was recently appointed
by
Governor Mike Easley to the NC Board of Transportation representing Environmental
policy and planning issues. She serves on the Board of Trustees of the
Triangle Transit Association, and on the Capitol Area Metropolitan Planning
Organization (MPO.) Ms Szlosberg currently serves as
Chair of the Hillsborough Street Partnership, a multiagency organization
dedicated to creating a safer, aesthetically pleasing and more economically
prosperous Historic Hillsborough Street area. And she is President of
the NC Conservation Council, the state's oldest and largest statewide
conservation
group.
Ms. Szlosberg also serves community interests through her work as President of the University Park Homeowners Association, a historic Raleigh neighborhood near NC State University. She is also on the Board of Directors of Haven House of Wake County - an organziation dedicated to providing safe shelter and help for families in crisis.
Dr. Ray Taylor is phasing into retirement spending his time between Maine and Spain. He will continue teaching on-line courses at NC State University and last we heard has applied for postmaster position in a local town. The School Transportation Group greatly appreciates Dr. Taylor's participation in the first year of our activities.
School Transportation Group Member Quoted by a Recent National News Article
Over six-year period (1993-1994 to 1998-1999 school year), 4,463 students were killed in all modes of travel during school transportation hours. 81% (3,600) were killed in passenger vehicle crashes. 67% of those fatalities involved students ages 16, 17, or 18.
"We have reached the point where people seem willing to accept these losses as the price we pay for our lifestyle," said Doug Robertson, Director of Highway Safety Research Center at UNC-Chapel Hill who is leading the National Academy of Sciences study assessing school transportation safety. "The losses are only going to get worse."
Sean McLaurin, a highway safety specialist at the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, says the nation is losing the equivalent off a passenger jet filled with teens every month without drawing national attention. "What we have are creeping, insidious losses that mask the scope of the tragedy,"
For your information, during the same period, there were 223 students killed during school transportation hours in North Carolina.
Facility Needs Survey
North Carolina Department of Public Instruction recently published a Facility Needs Survey for North Carolina public schools. The projected increase in K-12 students in the next five years are 79,099 (6.4%). The rate of growth will accelerate with high schools growing by 11.2% (36,422), middle schools growing by 8% (23,372), and elementary schools growth slowing to 3.1% (19,303) in next five years.
According to Joel Cranford at NCDOT's Municipal and School Transportation Assistance Group, if the current school travel pattern continues, these 79,099 additional students in NC schools will have the following transportation impacts:
- The growth of high school students will increase student drivers and parking spaces by 10,433 additional vehicles.
- Additional parent traffic generated at a school campus entering and exiting (not including buses and faculty) is 59,777 additional vehicle trips per day with elementary schools generate nearly half of the vehicle trips.
- The additional vehicle trips generated by parent traffic equates to 19.67 miles additional queue lane.
- Then there are estimated 800 additional school buses and undetermined vehicle trips from school staff.
School Transportation Group Website Receives 4-Star Rating
An article in April 2001 issue of the School Transportation News featured two cutting edge school bus web sites. The School Transportation Group's web site is featured side-by-side with National Highway Traffic Administration's home page! Not only did the article praise STG's web site, it also did good job describing what the School Transportation Group is all about:
"The STG website features an attractive, well-organized interface that helps users easily find their way around."
"The research projects STG undertakes promises to be on the cutting edge of industry research for years to come. A visit to this web site will give you a glimpse into the future of pupil transportation"
Both web sites received 4-star rating from this national trade magazine.The web site is created by Laurie Vandiford-Hobbs, NCSU-ITRE.
View
the PDF version of
the whole School Transportation News article
PDF's are viewable
with a free Acrobat Reader 
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