The wheels on the bus go ‘round and ‘round…until they come to a railroad track.
No that’s not part of the song.
However, once that bus reaches the crossing, it stops and opens its door.
. . Have you ever wondered why?
Well let’s see?
Is it to let the “Ghost Train Conductor” on the bus!
No not really.
But I looked into the bus, and it was full of people! Alright I’ll stop now!
Before I talk about buses today, let’s briefly look at how far we’ve come.
Before it became law, school buses didn’t have to open their doors at railroads.
Sure, they stopped to check for an oncoming train.
But when visibility is low, say, in fog or during a snowstorm, that method can prove
dangerously ineffective.
Everything changed in the 1930s, but the situation still wasn’t ideal.
Originally, a student was assigned as a “lookout” during each ride.
They’d get off the bus once it stopped and look both ways down the railroad crossing.
This continued until it was decided, for good reason, that it was too big a responsibility
put on these young volunteers’ shoulders.
Since then, drivers have continued to open their doors to take a good look and listen.
The change has been helpful, as bus accidents are rare these days.
So, these days!
Now you know it all comes down to safety and lessons learned.
By opening the door AND their side window, a bus driver is better able to hear if a train
is coming.
They aren’t left to depend solely on their vision.
And if you know much about trains, then you’re aware that they’re required by law to sound
the horn each time they approach a crossing.
Once a school bus driver knows for sure that the coast is clear, they close the door and
cross over.
Having both your vision and hearing at work is good, but further safety precautions are
taken as well.
Besides coming to a full stop 5 to 15 feet before the crossing (plus opening the door
and window), bus drivers must turn off anything that creates distracting sounds, including
the radio and fans.
They also turn on their hazards so that a vehicle approaching from behind will know
to stop.
These rules apply to all buses in the US and Canada, as well as trucks carrying hazardous
materials.
Besides the railroad thing, I always wondered…
- Why are school buses yellow?
Of course, not all buses are yellow – just look at the ones that run as part of public
transit.
But school buses are always that bright sunny hue.
In fact, it’s officially called School Bus Yellow!
It’s the color that stands out the most to the human eye, day or night, peripheral
vision included!
The black color for the lettering was chosen because of how well it stands out against
the yellow.
Ok, makes sense, but…
- Why is the roof painted white?
Again, not all school buses have a white roof – it’s mostly newer models.
But if you happen to run a school and your buses don’t have it, you might consider
getting the fleet a new paint job!
White reflects the sun’s heat better, so it keeps the inside of the bus 10° cooler.
That’s crucial since most buses don’t have AC.
By the way, this natural cooling is one of the reasons why most planes are all white
too!
- Why are the windows tinted?
Again, it works as a natural coolant in a vehicle that usually doesn’t come with air
conditioning.
But, doesn’t white reflect sunlight and black absorb it?
Not for windows.
The dark tint blocks a lot of sunlight from getting in, and it retains interior heat in
the winter!
Win-win!
- Why is the steering wheel so massive?
Several reasons here: first, most buses don’t have power steering.
This system normally helps the driver use less force to turn the wheels.
Buses don’t have it because there’s always the risk that it could fail.
Also, a bigger machine simply requires bigger parts, especially without that power steering.
A tiny sedan-sized steering wheel just wouldn’t be able to turn those big front wheels because
it wouldn’t create enough rotational movement, or torque.
You’d have to keep turning and turning the steering wheel just to get the wheels to move
a tiny bit.
So, safety and mechanics!
- Why don’t they have seatbelts?
Well, that’s not always the case.
In the US, it depends on the state.
So far, 8 have passed laws requiring school buses to have seatbelts.
Occasionally, individual school districts have the freedom to decide whether to implement
them.
They’re not really necessary since school buses are specifically designed with safety
in mind.
Because they’re so large and have such close quarters, what with all those rows and big
seats, the interior serves as a sort of protective bubble around the kids.
And there’s always the worry that seatbelts could slow down an emergency evacuation.
Oh, I’ve only just begun.
Here’s a quick flash-round of the most fascinating bus facts!
- There are currently about 427,000 school buses in America alone!
Alone?
We should pair them up!
Nah, this means they transport half the children in the United States (roughly 26 million).
By the way, did you ride the bus or did your parents take you to school?
Let me know down in the comments!
- If you’ve ever dreamed of owning your own big yellow bus, you can go to eBay now
and purchase one for about $3,000.
- Not licensed to drive a bus?
Think outside the bus!
TumbleBus converts them into smaller-scale gymnasiums, fully equipped with mats, bars,
and climbing walls!
- An average school bus can reach a max of 65 mph (although local speed limit laws for
them are usually much lower!).
It may not seem like much, but remember: they’re built with safety in mind above all else!
- But that didn’t stop American Paul Stender from having fun!
He added a Phantom fighter jet engine to a school bus, boosting its speed up to 366 mph!
Hey, you’d never be late for school again!
- The largest bus in the world is the Neoplan Jumbocruiser.
They stopped production in 1992, but the jumbo-sized coach didn’t disappoint!
The double-decker was almost 60 feet long, versus your average city bus that’s about
40 feet in length!
- In other countries outside of North America, buses are different colors too.
Obviously, you have the classic red double-deckers in London.
Seoul categorizes its public transportation into 4 colors – blue, green, red, and yellow
– depending on what parts of the city they run to and from.
- The first buses were pretty much horse-drawn farm wagons in the late 1800s.
The carriage was labeled “Public School” and it transported children that lived far
away.
(Most kids still walked to school at that time.)
Students would sit around the outside of the bus, and they didn’t have any kind of protection
from the elements.
Eventually, in the early 1900s, the horse was switched out for an engine.
The idea to paint them yellow came around the 1930s.
- Today, Buses are adapting with technological advances.
Just last year, Ontario added 13 electric school buses to their collection.
With electric cars on the rise, school transportation was not to be left behind!
We’ve come so far from horse-drawn carriages!
What’s next?
Flying buses?!
Wouldn’t you love that?
- According to the American School Bus Council, buses save an estimated $7.7 billion every
year!
Each school bus takes the place of 36 individual vehicles from the road, saving time on that
morning commute.
It helps parents out too.
They don’t spend as much on gas, and it doesn’t take extra time to get to work!
- Buses also help our environment.
If every child in a community rode the bus to school, it would save more than 2 billion
gallons of fuel!
- They help keep school attendance numbers up too.
One education report found that students who rode the bus were much less likely to miss
school.
Hard to skip when the bus is out there honking for you, eh?
- There are perks to being a school bus driver!
On field trips, they’re sometimes gifted free entrance to those destinations.
Around the holidays, students and their parents also give little presents to the drivers too!
So, kids, don’t forget to thank your driver!
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