School buses are back on the roads as students return to class
Students across Simcoe County waited anxiously Tuesday morning for the bus ride to school for the first day of a new academic year.
Bill Hamilton has been a school bus driver in Simcoe County for 10 years and says he looks forward to this day every year.
"Happy to see the kids back on the bus, lots of smiles this morning, and they're excited to be back," says Hamilton.
The school bus driver says he's relieved to have a sense of normalcy back in his job after two uncertain pandemic years.
"It's good to get back into the routine. I hear that field trips and sports will be back on, so that will be great for the kids and great for us, keeps us working," says Hamilton.
It was a busy summer for the Simcoe County Student Transportation Consortium (SCSTC), ensuring the 700 bus routes were set for over 150 public and Catholic schools.
"In Simcoe County this year, we are transporting around 38,000 students on about 700 vehicles. Currently, we are not anticipating a driver shortage in Simcoe County, and we do keep working with our local operators to monitor route coverage," says SCSTC CEO Kim Malkamaki.
Planning this year went smoothly, and Malkamaki says they have enough drivers for every route and several spare drivers to assist with absences. With COVID-19 restrictions removed, assigned seating on school buses is a thing of the past.
Simcoe County bus drivers travel a collective 65,000 kilometres per day. Hamilton says the biggest challenge is ensuring that the kids make it on and off the bus safely.
"We really need the drivers to respect when they see the red light to come to a complete stop when the kids are getting off," says Hamilton.
New this year is the amber light system. When approaching a school bus with the amber lights flashing, drivers should slow down and prepare to stop.
CTVNews.ca Top Stories
Large numbers of New York City police officers begin entering Columbia University campus
Large numbers of New York City police officers began entering the Columbia University late Tuesday as dozens of pro-Palestinian protesters remained on the campus.
Poilievre kicked out of Commons after calling Prime Minister Justin Trudeau 'wacko'
Testy exchanges between the prime minister and his chief opponent ended with the Opposition leader and one of his MPs being ejected from the House of Commons on Tuesday -- and the rest of Conservative caucus walking out of the chamber in protest.
Baby, grandparents among 4 people killed in wrong-way police chase on Ontario's Hwy. 401
A police chase which started with a liquor store robbery in Bowmanville Monday night ended in tragedy some 20 minutes later when a suspect fleeing police entered Highway 401 in the wrong direction and caused a pileup which killed an infant and the child's grandparents, as well as the suspect, investigators say.
Freeland leaves capital gains tax change out of coming budget implementation bill, here's why
Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland will be tabling yet another omnibus bill to pass a sweeping range of measures promised in her April 16 federal budget, though left out of the legislation will be the government's proposed capital gains tax change.
Sword-wielding man attacks passersby in London, killing a 14-year-old boy and injuring 4 others
A man wielding a sword attacked members of the public and police officers in a northeast London suburb Tuesday, killing a 14-year-old boy and injuring four other people, British authorities said.
Man dies after suffering cardiac arrest while waiting in ER, widow wants investigation
When an ambulance took David Lippert to the hospital in March of 2023, the 68-year-old Kitchener, Ont., executive was hoping to find out why he was feeling weak and unable to walk. Some 24 hours later, he was found unresponsive in the ER.
CSE says it shared information on Chinese hacking of parliamentarians in 2022
While several MPs and senators say they were only recently made aware of China-backed hackers targeting them, the Communications Security Establishment, one of Canada's intelligence agencies, says it shared information about the incident with parliamentary officials in June of 2022.
WATCH Arnold Schwarzenegger spotted filming in Elora, Ont.
The name of the project has not been officially released although it’s widely believed to be the Netflix series FUBAR.
Eviction for landlord's use was legitimate, despite owners' partial move, B.C. court rules
A B.C. judge has upheld the eviction of a family from their North Vancouver townhouse, finding that the landlords did not take an unreasonable amount of time to move into the home after the tenants vacated it.