Bus driver’s plea to parents
A former school bus driver reckons there’s a simple measure to reduce the number of children hit when dropped off by school buses.
It’s simply to have parents meet the children on the side of the road the bus drops them on.
Sam Adams is now retired, but he drove buses for almost 30 years.
He hit a child once and at another time he was travelling closely behind a school bus when it hit and killed a child.
‘‘Every time a child gets hit by a bus, it seems to be because they are running out in front to see their parents on the other side of the road,’’ Adams says. ‘‘I’ve seen it so many times. ‘‘No one talks about the mother, father, grandmother being on the other side of the road.’’
On Tuesday, a six-year-old boy was hit while crossing the road to greet his nan and brother after getting off his school bus near Te Aroha.
It nearly turned to tragedy when he was was run over by an SUV towing a boat and trailer on First Avenue North, Waihou, in the Eastern Waikato.
He was flown to Waikato Hospital in a serious condition.
The boy’s grandmother and brother were waiting for him to cross the road near the family’s home. The pair witnessed the event. Adams says children are told not to run across the other side of the road, but that always goes out of their heads when they’re excited to see a parent after the schoolday. ‘‘It’s easy enough to sort out.’’ Adams used to explain to the caregivers why they should stand on the same side of the road as the bus exit.
‘‘Every single one of them I told got it and stood on the same side of the road.’’
He thinks it should be a universal message.
It does not cost money - it just takes common sense, Adams says.
It was personal to Adams, who ran over a child who had run in front of his bus.
‘‘He saw mum and ran out in front of the bus. I was exonerated, no one was to blame.’’
Another school bus driver, David White, agrees that there needs to be an emphasis on parents greeting their children on the same side of the road as the bus stops.
‘‘You would not believe the amount of parents that stay on the other side of the road,’’ White says.
It would be the simplest solution, he says.
White suggests speed cameras and signs alerting drivers to the cameras should adorn every school bus.