Family upset over change to bus routine
For about 12 years the school bus has pulled in front of the home of Paul and Sandy Knight on Abercrombie Road and picked up their daughter Ally, who uses a wheelchair because she has cerebral palsy.
But not anymore.
Now the school bus has to back into their driveway or find some other place farther from the home where it can pull off the road before it will pick her up or unload her.
The family and regional Centre for Education have been forced to come up with the work-around after a motor vehicle compliance officer said that the bus is not allowed to stop in front of the house to drop off Ally.
Marla MacInnis, a spokesperson for the Nova Scotia Department of Transportation and Infrastructure Renewal, said the decision was made for safety reasons.
“We have been made aware of a school bus that, contrary to regulations, was making a stop on a busy road without traffic control lights,” she wrote in a response to questions from The News. “These regulations are in place for the safety of students, the driver and the travelling public. We have presented a number of options to the local Centre of Education and believe there is a safe solution that can be found.”
Jennifer Rodgers, communications manager with the Chignecto-Central Regional Centre for Education said the centre was told the bus stop must be off the travelled portion of a highway.
“To accommodate this instruction, CCRCE has been working with the family to find a solution,” Rodgers said. “We visited the family home to look at the bus stop location and since that meeting, the bus driver is now backing into the student’s driveway to ensure they can be dropped off at their home safely.”
She said part of the issue is the time it takes to unload a wheelchair from the bus.
In the past, the bus has just parked off to the side of the road in front of the Knight’s home long enough for her to be unloaded. The stop sign was not extended because it would tie up traffic, but the turning signal was on to indicate that the bus was pulled over. This was deemed unsafe. “A school bus cannot load or discharge passengers on a public roadway without its loading lights regardless of the student mobility issue,” Rodgers said.
Stopping traffic by putting out the loading light long enough was also deemed unsafe.
“Using the lights while unloading a wheelchair takes approximately five minutes and we’ve seen motorists drive by busses if the unloading takes too long which is not safe.”
Sandy and Paul feel that this is unnecessary.
“My argument is that well we could just put the traffic lights out and stop traffic,” said Sandy. “You can’t discriminate against a child in a wheelchair. There are other bus stops where there are many children get off the bus and it would take much longer for 15 kids to unload a bus than it would be for one child on a ramp up and down.”
Paul points out that unlike kids without mobility issues, his daughter always has an adult with her when she’s getting off the bus so he believes there is less of a safety concern. While the couple appreciate the school bus driver backing into their driveway now to drop off their daughter, they believe it becomes more of an issue in winter when, if nothing changes, they’ll have to make sure there is enough space cleared for the bus to be able to get in and put down the ramp.
As far as Paul is concerned, it’s all unnecessary and he’s reached out to people he knows in the political world who have all agreed that in their interpretation of the law it isn’t breaking any rules.
“We’ve been doing this for 11 almost 12 years now. For 11 almost 12 years, it’s worked perfect. We’ve never had any issues until now.”
He hopes that for the sake of not only his daughter, but also others with wheelchairs that the matter will be resolved.