It even smells like a street
School
buses are an interesting cultural difference between North America and
Europe. Where I grew up, all kids just walk or ride a bike to school
(or ride their little mopeds, once you are fifteen, which at least used
to be a great milestone in many boys' lives for this very reason), or
if they live far enough from the school as is often the case in rural
areas, they are given free bus passes or there might be a special taxi
that picks up the kids and drops them off. The American-style school
bus system has always impressed me as a bit of a mollycoddling, but
presumably there are cultural reasons that necessitate it. As there
must be for the fact that once cannot use modern normal buses as school
buses, but they must always be those special old-fashioned models. Nice
deal for the automaker if you can get it, I guess. And of course there
is the inherent humour value of the short buses that cannot be
overlooked.
Around here in Toronto area all kids are apparently not entitled to school bus service, since during the time that kids go to school and come home from school you can see lots of them walking, and the crossing guards help them cross the street. It was also surprising to me how very widespread these crossing guards are. Apparently the middle-aged housewives and senior citizens need something to do to feel important and valuable to society. Even so, the whole crossing guard system just feels so... inefficient to me, especially in crossings that already have traffic lights. It would interesting to see a cost-benefit analysis of how many innocent lives the crossing guards save each year, and how many total hours of work this takes.
The thing about the redundancy of the crossing guards, which I immediately noticed when we moved here, is that the drivers are far more courteous towards pedestrians here than they are in where I came from. Around here the drivers always stop and let you cross no matter what. Of course this is nice, but this sometimes goes to ridiculous lengths so that when I'm approaching a crossing as a pedestrian and a car is coming, but I am so far away that the car could just keep going and go through the crossing without the slightest chance of hitting me, the driver will still slow down and let me cross first. Then I feel like I ought to hurry up and cross so that I wouldn't be a bother. Of course, all this lull of safety will probably come bite me in the ass when I will eventually encounter the driver who does not follow these principles.
Around here in Toronto area all kids are apparently not entitled to school bus service, since during the time that kids go to school and come home from school you can see lots of them walking, and the crossing guards help them cross the street. It was also surprising to me how very widespread these crossing guards are. Apparently the middle-aged housewives and senior citizens need something to do to feel important and valuable to society. Even so, the whole crossing guard system just feels so... inefficient to me, especially in crossings that already have traffic lights. It would interesting to see a cost-benefit analysis of how many innocent lives the crossing guards save each year, and how many total hours of work this takes.
The thing about the redundancy of the crossing guards, which I immediately noticed when we moved here, is that the drivers are far more courteous towards pedestrians here than they are in where I came from. Around here the drivers always stop and let you cross no matter what. Of course this is nice, but this sometimes goes to ridiculous lengths so that when I'm approaching a crossing as a pedestrian and a car is coming, but I am so far away that the car could just keep going and go through the crossing without the slightest chance of hitting me, the driver will still slow down and let me cross first. Then I feel like I ought to hurry up and cross so that I wouldn't be a bother. Of course, all this lull of safety will probably come bite me in the ass when I will eventually encounter the driver who does not follow these principles.
School buses have to be provided for children who live more than X distance away from their school, with X varying according to age. At least this is the rule in the United States, Canada's probably the same. X might be as long as one mile for high schoolers, and is shorter for younger children. Buses may be required for children living closer to the schools if they would have to walk along pedestrian-unfriendly roads without sidewalks.
Peter
Iron Rails & Iron Weights
Posted by Anonymous | 12:50 PM