Sean C. Morgan
Of The New Era
School District 55 Transportation Supervisor L.D. Ellison said final snow routes should be set by the end of this week.
“I’m about a week behind, but all the drivers have reviewed the routes to make sure we didn’t miss anything,” Ellison said. The snow routes will mainly exclude certain hilly areas of School District 55, affecting a small minority of the district’s students.
Highways 228 and 20 will usually be sanded and clear, Ellison said, but areas such as Fern Ridge Road, 43rd Avenue, Wiley Creek Road and Mark’s Ridge Road will be affected. Buses will not venture up those roads when the snow gets deep.
Instead, if parents can safely drive their children down, the district will pick up students at collection points at the bases of those hills, Ellison said. For Mark’s Ridge, Little Promises, the former Pleasant Valley School, will be a collection point. Buses will collect students from Fern Ridge at the Linn County maintenance shop on Highway 228 and at the intersection of Fern Ridge Road and Highway 228.
On days when snow routes are in effect, schools will delay opening for two hours to give staff time to get to school and for weather to clear and road conditions improve.
“A lot of times, the flatland roads are clear,” Ellison said, but because of the higher-elevation roads, the district has canceled school entirely.
That happened over a three-day period last school year, he said. “All of our missed days could have been covered by snow routes.”
Sweet Home had snow on the ground, but the buses could easily have handled it in the flatlands, he said.
Snow routes will affect 100 to 125 students, Ellison said. Most of the rest, about 1,800 students who ride buses, will be able to ride safely to school during those relatively mild snow events.
The district has had snow routes before, he said. For about six or seven years, snow had not been an issue. The last couple of years, the district has canceled school due to snow.
The decision on whether to cancel school due to snow is made between 5 a.m. and 5:30 a.m. If the weather is looking ugly at 4 a.m., Ellison said he will contact Supt. Larry Horton and the two make the decision.
Horton provides information to TV and radio stations. Among stations reporting school closures in Sweet Home are KFIR at 720 AM, KUGN at 590 AM, KPNW at 1120 AM and KEZI, Channel 9 in Eugene.
The Transportation Department also is in the process of purchasing 10 or 11 new buses, Ellison said. Prices have gone up as much as $8,000 per vehicle due to increased emissions standards on the 2007 engines.
The final price will depend on whether the district is able to purchase buses with 2006 engines, he said. The district has bids coming from two bus companies to supply three types of buses.
The district will purchase four special-needs buses, one travel bus with storage space and six or seven “workhorses” – general 77-passenger buses like the 11 purchased in 2002.
The district’s oldest buses are tired, Ellison said, and they will be traded in.
The district has three special-needs buses and also a full-size bus purchased in 2002. The full-size bus is used to allow disabled children to attend field trips with their classes on a single bus.
The district is planning to purchase four new special needs buses, including one with wheelchair equipment.
The district usually has 26 or 27 buses in service, Ellison said. With this purchase, the district will gain one more bus.
The district lost one bus in 1998 and never replaced it, he said. “And we’ve scrambled at times.”
Three of the district’s oldest buses are special-needs buses from 1989.
Their gasoline engines have 160,000 to 185,000 miles on them. Several of the oldest diesels have more than 200,000 miles.
The district maintains Senior Center buses with 200,000 to 400,000 miles on them, but those are highway miles, Ellison said. The district’s buses put on hard miles on stop-and-go routes 70 to 80 miles long with 20 stops.
Generally, the district’s oldest buses are used on city routes, Ellison said. The district has one bus that is not used on routes with hills because its transmission “wheezes.”
The district puts between 390,000 and 420,000 miles per year on its fleet.
The district will purchase the special-needs buses and the travel bus from Western Bus Bluebird. The remaining buses will be purchased from Brattan International.