UTU Bus News Digest - August, 1999

UTU Bus Department News Digest
Information of interest to transportation employees August, 1999

Ryder sells its school transportation division

Ryder Student Transportation Service, North America's second-largest school bus contractor, has been acquired by a British transportation company called FirstGroup PLC.

Ryder's public transit division and its public fleet maintenance service are also part of the $940 million deal, which FirstGroup officials believe will be a platform of growth in the U.S. transportation market.

Ryder's school transportation division, based in St. Louis, operates a fleet of more than 10,000 school buses, second in size only to Laidlaw Transit Inc. in Burlington, Ontario.

FirstGroup is Britain's largest bus operator. Another large British transportation concern, National Express, entered the U.S. school bus contracting sector in the past year by acquiring two companis: Crabtree-Harmon Corp. in Belton, Mo., and Robinson Bus Service in Chicago. (SBF - 8/99)

Teens invent safety device for buses

Four middle school students in Dayton, Ohio, received a $25,000 grant from the Bayer Corp. and the National Science Foundation (NSF) for their plan to improve school bus safety. Lisa Bales, Julie Craig, Tony Liao and Alexis Liebst - eighth-graders at Hadley E. Watts Middle School - called their idea "Bus Door Bust."

Their proposal is to replace the rubber door linings of school buses with bristles, which would allow straps, hooks and other items to pass through easily, reducing the chance of a child getting injured.

The students came up with the idea after a local teenager, Brandie Sue Browder, was killed when her jacket drawstring became stuck in the school bus door. The driver, unaware that Browder's clothing had been caught, drove off, dragging her to her death.

The four students wanted to come up with a plan to prevent such tragedies from occurring again. They competed for the Bayer/NFS Award for the 1998-99 school year, along with nearly 2,000 other students. The team from Dayton won the $25,000 Columbus Foundation Community Grant, which rewards ideas that may become a reality in the community in the following year.

"With the help of the Columbus Grant, we will be working with the Department of Pupil Transportation for the Ohio Department of Education to pursue our idea," said Julie Craig. "We think the bristles are a practical, inexpensive way to save lives. (SBF - 8/99)

Bus Drivers tackle workplace violence

Bus Drivers always have faced the daily dangers posed by bad weather and hazardous roads. Increasingly, they are being confronted with workplace violence.

Last November, when a passenger aboard a Seattle bus shot the driver, the vehicle sailed over a bridge guardrail, plunged into an apartment building and injured 30 passengers. In February, a San Diego bus driver was kidnapped and sexually assaulted after completing her route. A passenger boarding a Wisconsin bus last year doused the vehicle with gasoline, burning several passengers.

The Transit Union is pushing hard for legislation to crack down on attacks that endanger the lives of the drivers and the 6 million passengers who ride public buses every day. The Protect America's Transit Workers and Riding Public Act (H.R. 1080), introduced by Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-Ore.), would make it a federal offense to intentionally cause death or serious harm to drivers and passengers, intentionally damage vehicles, impair safe operation, make false alarm reports, carry unauthorized firearms or propel objects or destructive substances at mass transit vehicles.

"This legislation would prove an additional layer of protection from the assaults that have become a great concern to transit operators over the last year," ATU President Janes La Sala says.

CTA uses "new" fuel for buses

THE CHICAGO TRANSIT AUTHORITY (CTA) last week became the nation's first transit agency to operate some of its buses on oxygenated diesel, a blend of ethanol, diesel and a special additive. The fuel, developed by Pure Energy Corp., is intended to significantly reduce emissions at only slightly higher costs than pure diesel. If the test on 15 buses is successful, the CTA plans to expand use of the fuel. (7/28/99 UTN)