On a Grand Scale


WE PROFILE THE TRANSPORTATION DEPARTMENTS AT SOME OF THE LARGEST SCHOOL DISTRICTS IN THE COUNTRY TO SEE HOW THEIR OPERATIONS, AND YELLOW BUSES, GO ’ROUND AND ’ROUND


WRITTEN BY SYLVIA ARROYO


T 46 School Transportation News November 2013


he saying, “It takes a village to raise a child” can also be applied to student transportation. It takes a village of bus drivers, routers, GIS mappers,


directors, superintendents, students, parents and more to raise and maintain a quality, fast-paced and intricate system of busing students to and from school on time five days a week.


Tose who are chief of student transpor-


tation at some of the largest or top school districts in the country, such as New York City, Philadelphia and Denver, approach their operations the same way other direc- tors would, regardless of their department’s size. Teir mission is to serve their schools, the students and parents in the most effi- cient and cost-effective manner. But these operations roll on a much larger scale, which


at times produces challenges, and solutions, unique to them.


NEW YORK CITY — SCALE AND COMPLEXITY


With an annual budget of $1 billion, the


NYC Department of Education’s Office of Pupil Transportation is the largest school transportation department in the nation. Te department buses about 150,000 students and provides Metro cards for another 540,000 students. Te total district enrollment is about 1.1 million students, but OPT also provides busing for private and religious schools as mandated under the state education law. For the most part, the OPT is unlike most other transportation departments at school districts, and the area it serves is


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