SCHOOL BUS CRASHES IN WATERLOO REGION

Last Saturday the Waterloo Region Record carried this story titled "School bus crashes down last year". The sub-title was "No students injured for first time in seven years". I love the quote from Student Transportation Services of Waterloo namely "Transportation continues to be very safe for students". Are you kidding me? Just because some self-serving twit says so, doesn't make it so. The sub-title is downright horrifying in that they are bragging that no student was injured for the first time in seven years. Good God what do they consider a bad record; deaths every year?

This story then seamlessly rolls right into irrelevancies. Bus collisions are not about cars blowing past stopped school buses with their lights flashing. They are not about traffic cameras being installed on buses to catch ignorant car drivers. If there has been a collision between a bus and a car you've got the evidence right there on one of the buses bumpers.

What I would like to see are the statistics for single vehicle (bus) accidents. I'd like to see the statistics when cars and buses collide, who is at fault the majority of the time. Keep in mind that buses are very big and heavy and they are painted bright yellow. Are the majority of last year's 48 collisions a result of hitting moving vehicles or hitting trees, posts, parked cars and or simply sliding off of snowy roads. This is very relevant as when my kids were riding school buses my wife and I pulled them off the bus after a number of single vehicle accidents by one driver. Shortly afterwards she managed to bounce off several trees, all on her own, and end up with the front end of the bus hanging out over the Grand River during a high water event.