Q: Which modes are most commonly involved in crossing accidents involving pedestrians?
A: Crossing incidents are far more common with schoolbuses, largely because the passengers are
children, and particularly smaller children (especial age 10 or younger) who are not capable of
crossing simple streets by virtue of their age and development (Children in Traffic [Stina
Sandels, University of Stockholm, 1968]). But in the more than 100 crossing incidents in which I
have been involved as an expert witness, I have found them to occur occasionally on almost
every mode – but more commonly on those modes whose schedules are commonly too tight
(such as transit, paratransit and non-emergency medical transportation (NEMT) service).
Contrary to curb-to-curb or door-to-door services like paratransit or NEMT service, on transit
service, passengers should cross behind the bus. But they often do not. And poor bus stop
positioning (e.g., bus stops on the near side of an intersection) often encourages them to
Comment: Most of the striking vehicles are not the public transportation vehicles themselves,
but a vehicle driven by a third-party motorist. This is most common in schoolbus-related
crossing incidents, and usually when the striking motorist does not obey the bus’ extended stop
arm and red flashers.
Q: Do crossing incidents occur most commonly at pickups or drop-offs?
A: At both. In schoolbus service, they are more common at PM drop-off points, when students
are more excited and often do not follow established crossing procedures.
Comment: Some additional procedures should be performed by drivers during drop-offs. In
schoolbus service, reasonable and prudent drivers would count the children who alight, following
their movements, and not disengage the bus’ crossing equipment until each student is accounted
for – either completely across the street or in a position where he or she will not be crossing (i.e.,
walking on the sidewalk, up a driveway, etc.). On other modes that are not demand-responsive
(i.e., door-to-door or curb-to-curb), passengers who alight can be told to wait until the vehicle
leaves before crossing. This practice would help greatly if the stops lie on the far side of the
intersection, where crossing behind the bus coincides with the normal practice of crossing at an
intersection.
Q: Are there other tools that can further ensure student crossing safety?
A: Yes. For example, on school buses, driver’s logs can indicate whether or not each student
riding will or will not be crossing to or from the bus stop. And blanket policy statements like,
“Always arrive at your bus stop 5 to 10 minutes before the bus is scheduled to arrive” should be
modified, for schoolbus services, to state that, ” Always arrive at your bus stop or the area
across the street from it….” Even on “local” streets with extremely low volumes of traffic,
where mid-block stops are not usually dangerous, it is still better for students to wait until the
bus arrives, with its crossing devices. Information about such practices should be taught to both
students and to their parents or guardians.
Comment: Such tools are invaluable for substitute drivers unfamiliar with which side of the
street the students live on. Asking each one who alights is clearly helpful – but is obviously not
helpful during pickups, especially if and when a student waiting across the street is a bit late and
knowing about him or her, the driver can wait briefly, and call the dispatcher, who should be
informed by parents of students who will not be traveling to school [by schoolbus] on that day,
and notify this absenteeism on drivers’ logs or radio this information to drivers as they get near
the intersection when the pickup is to occur.
Q: When a schoolbus driver is at fault, has he or she violated any Federal regulations?
A: No. While these procedures are uniform, and a clear industry standard, most regulations for
schoolbus service are state regulations.
Comments: Occasionally these regulations differ. For example, states have different
requirements for when the amber flashers should be engaged, to notify motorists behind and
approaching the schoolbus that it will soon stop. One state I know of has three conflicting
regulations for this distance. A few states do not even require motorists to stop and remain
behind a loading or unloading schoolbus until its crossing devices are disengaged. For example,
in New Jersey, a motorist may come to a stop, and then pass the bus at 10 or fewer miles per
hour. In Michigan, the practice is 15 or fewer miles per hour.
Q: Are there flaws in school policies that account for crossing fatalities and injuries?
A: Yes. The far-most common is a typical, and sloppily-worded request for students to arrive at
their bus stops five or 10 minutes before their bus is scheduled to arrive. Many of the children
killed in the more than 100 crossing cases I’ve served in as an expert witness succumbed to this
inexcusable error.
Comment: Knowing that roughly half the students live on the side of the street opposite of where
the bus stop is, correct, safe and responsible instructions should ask the students to arrive and
wait, five or 10 minutes early at either the bus stop or the waiting area across the street from
it. This way, these students will not cross to their stop before the bus comes along with its
crossing equipment and driver procedures to help them cross safely and, instead, they jaywalk
across the roadway without this help. This problem is worse on busy streets where the stops are
located at a mid-block position – almost always negligent bus stop selection.
Q: Can non-yellow schoolbuses be equipped with stop arms and red (and amber) flashers?
Comment: This practice – the buses are usually white, not “schoolbus yellow” – is permitted
because these vehicles are considerably less costly than fully-compliant schoolbuses, and rarely
have other safety features (e.g., “compartmentalized seats”) required of fully-certified and
fully–compliant schoolbuses. Many or most private schools and charter schools purchase and
deploy ”non-conforming vans,” and most of them do not have any crossing equipment on them.
A: In several states, yes. These are referred to, by professionals in the pupil transportation
community, as “non-conforming vans.”
Q: Can other non-public transportation vehicles be equipped with schoolbus crossing equipment?
A: Yes. While a dangerous practice, selected vehicles like ice cream trucks – which children
chase down the street and cross to and from – are permitted to contain red flashers. (Stop arms
are rare.)
Comment: I believe this to be a dangerous idea. At the same time, it may occasionally save a life
or two by making approaching motorists more aware that children may be crossing to and from
the vehicle. However, it may lure children into the street by suggesting that they will be safe with
the flashers engaged – just as they are safer in schoolbuses when their crossing equipment is
engaged.
Q: May motorists pass schoolbuses when the flashers and stop arms are engaged?
A: In a few states, yes – but not before slowing, and only at certain speeds.
Comment: These exceptions may have been eliminated at the time of this writing. But, for
example, a motorist in New Jersey must first come to a stop – but can then pass a schoolbus with
its flashers and stop arm engaged at 10 mph. In Michigan, the passing speed is (or used to be) 15
mph. Even so, doing so is very dangerous, and a reasonable and prudent motorist should never
pass a schoolbus loading or unloading (with its crossing equipment engaged), even if his or her
state’s regulations permit it.
Q: What are some of the scenarios that place students in danger, particularly at pickups?
A: The most dangerous practice is a child who has missed his or her bus chasing it down the
street. If and when the child catches up to it, and typically pounds on the side (to hope the driver
will stop to pick him or her up), the student often falls beneath the bus and is crushed by its curb-
side rear tires.
Comment: Students should be taught to never chase their schoolbus. At the same time, drivers
should be trained that occasionally one does, and to watch for such a student in the driver’s curb-
side exterior, rear-view mirrors, and if one is spotted chasing the bus, to immediately stop it to
ensure that the student is not run over. (But the student should be reported for this violation,
retrained, and appropriately punished for it.) To limit this possibility, schoolbus drivers
should never depart from a stop early.
Q: Are there things a driver should do if a student to be picked up is not at the stop?
A: Yes. Parents of students not attending school on a certain day or days should contact the
school’s (or its contractor’s) transportation department, and the driver whose bus that student is
assigned to should be told (typically by the dispatcher) not to expect the student. Otherwise,
drivers should wait a reasonable time for a missing student (a typical “reasonable” time may be
two to four minutes) who might be late, and might chase the bus down the street – and even
jaywalk across the street (often running into traffic) in order to do this.
Comment: Drivers picking up students at school to transport them home should be alerted about
students assigned to their buses who either did not attend school that day, who will be remaining
at school after the bus’ departure time (there are numerous after-school programs, particularly
sports), or if the student will be traveling home by other means.
Q: Apart from schoolbuses, what other forms do crossing incidents take?
A: Another common scenario – one rarely committed by schoolbuses – is public transportation
vehicles making “rolling left turns” – instead of stopping completely, or coming to a crawl before
turning left.
Comment: This happens mostly with transit vehicles, whose schedules are almost always too
tight, and drivers shave “running time” from their schedules by making “safety compromises”
(see safetycompromises.com). Making a rolling left turn can shave 10 or 15 seconds from that of
a proper, safe turn – or longer, if doing this helps the bus driver avoid getting “stuck in a light.”
Q: Are entities other than a bus agency or company sometimes at fault?
A: Yes. Based on traffic volume counts (taken periodically in most cities, on most major streets),
intersections are “upgraded” – first by adding stop signs and crosswalks, then adding traffic
signals, and finally (or simultaneous) adding pedestrian crossing signals. Such upgrades would
make every public transportation mode more safe.
Comment: Adding traffic lights and pedestrian crossing equipment is very costly, and cities
commonly lag behind what is needed according to what are known as “warrants,” which
document the upgrades needed based, mostly, on increased traffic volumes. Also, apart from high
traffic volumes, some of these upgrades are needed because many land uses (shopping malls,
clusters of high-density apartment units, housing developments with few entrances into them,
etc.) require moderate to large numbers of people crossing – even when these intersections are
not served by any buses.
Q: Since most vehicle striking pedestrians are personal occupancy vehicles (e.g., sedans, SUVs,
pickup trucks, etc.), not buses, are these motorists at fault?
A: Sometimes. And with schoolbus crossing incidents, often. In the latter case, ordinary
motorists sometimes disregard the engaged crossing devices of a schoolbus and pass it – striking
students crossing to or from the bus. But often schoolbus drivers commit omissions in their
crossing procedures, and the striking motorist is not at fault.
Comment: Even when an ordinary motorist is at fault, he or she may have minimum insurance
coverage. So most attorneys try to pursue public agencies or contractors who have “deep
pockets.” (In such cases, I often defend these entities – when the evidence suggests they are not
at fault.)
Q: Particularly with schoolbuses (most crossing incidents involve this mode), are the students or
their parents sometimes at fault?
A: Yes, they can be. There are basically seven steps a schoolbus driver should make to safety
cross a student. But engaging flashers and stop arms are not the final step. Yet they are often
interpreted as such by students or their parents, and upon seeing these crossing devices engaged,
students (with or without their parents) may think it’s safe to cross to or from the bus, and doing
so preempts the driver from completing all the steps.
Comment: Sometimes both the student and the striking motorist are at fault. Completion of all
crossing steps by the schoolbus driver will not prevent an incident if a motorist disregards the
bus driver’s engagement of crossing devices.
Q: When a student or a parent prematurely enters the roadway before the schoolbus driver
completes the execution of all steps of proper crossing procedures, and the student is struck by a
passing motorist, might a school district or its contract be liable for the incident?
A: Yes. This is the case more often with a school or school district than its private contractor (if
there is one). This is because a school has the responsibility to provide crossing instructions to
both its students and their parents or guardians. This duty is rarely delegated to contractors, who
only see the students when they approach or leave the bus, or while on it. In contrast, schools
have endless access to the students, and should find time to instruct them. (Letters to parents can
provide instruction about crossing to them.)
Comment: There are no federal regulations requiring that crossing instructions be provided to
students or their parent or guardians. And few states require them. But the provision of crossing
instructions to both are clearly the industry standard, it is not hard to understand why, and most
juries consider such instructions reasonable, if not essential.