PP14: Yellow buses

Once again we can see that America has all the best ideas, and has done for a while now. The school run in Britain puts an estimated extra billion car journeys onto our roads each year, which works out at an additional 2 million tonnes of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere. Environment aside it is a major cause of congestion with the school run being responsible for 20% of all rush hour traffic. Predictably then it also makes the roads much more dangerous and it is estimated that each year 40 deaths and over 900 serious injuries occur thanks to the increased traffic. This is despite ‘safety’ being listed as the primary motivation behind parents who drive their children to school.

Evidence from the United States suggests that the yellow buses also have significant psychological benefits for the children. Giving them the ability to catch up with their friends on the way to school (as opposed to during their first class) makes them calmer and more settled when they arrive. The buses are also specially designed to maximise safety and would therefore have to be purchased new, and the scheme would not merely commandeer existing coaches and buses.

Yellow school buses in Britain have already been piloted by several councils and with encouraging results. The program has not been taken any further simply because it involves a large amount of money to be spent. Purchasing the new buses, training the drivers to deal with children and providing a regular free service does not come cheaply. A nation wide scheme for primary school buses is estimated to cost around £184 million a year. However the overall savings to society (by removing the costs listed above) are calculated to be around £458 million.

Well worth doing, I think you will agree.

All stats were taken from a report by the Sutton Trust and can be found here.