Parents see improvements in CPS bus routes, find tracking app to be useful at times
Nia Hinson
COLUMBIA, Mo. (KMIZ)
Steve Tubbesing sits in his office on Brown Station Road in Columbia roughly four months after he and his family experienced what he called a “nightmare” with a newly found mindset.
Tubbesing is the grandfather to 11-and 8-year-old children who attend Jefferson Middle School and Ridgeway Elementary. Two days into the school year, his family experienced horror and uncertainty when the two were dropped off at a bus stop about 16 miles away from their actual bus stop.
“I mean that day that happened, she (the bus driver) didn’t run the whole route. She only ran half the route and she still had half a school bus full of kids when she took off for Hallsville,” Tubbesing said.
Months later, that bus driver no longer drives the school bus his granddaughters ride on, and Tubbesing no longer fears sending his family away.
“He shows up on time in the mornings and drops them off right where he’s supposed to in the evenings,” Tubbesing said. “It’s a big relief because we know where they’re going and when they’re going.”
Columbia Public Schools switched bus companies to DS Bus Lines heading into this school year, a switch from Student Transportation of America. At the beginning of the school year, parents claimed they were experiencing delays and wait times with the new company. The district had asked parents to be patient at the time, while the company worked through changes with the new company.
The new bus line also offers safety features, including giving parents the opportunity to track their child’s bus in real time using the app “Beacon Connect Family App,” as well as cameras inside and outside the buses.
District spokeswoman Michelle Baumstark told ABC 17 News via email on Wednesday the app launched for parents in September. Since then, 1,530 people have downloaded it, according to Baumstark.
An email with instructions on how to use the app was sent to families with children who ride buses and wish to use it. The app doesn’t allow people to track any bus around town, but rather has a radius around the student’s bus stop and alerts people when the bus enters that zone.
Baumstark claims buses have been running well and CPS is having a good year.
“The buses are brand new, we have a new transportation provider, and we have regular routes staffed. DS is always looking to build its driver pool to allow for more flexibility when drivers need to be absent and to take on more field trip and travel charters,” Baumstark wrote.
While some are seeing improvements in routes and experiencing fewer delays, some like Jordan Jones– the mother to a seventh grader at Bethel Street Center– are still dealing with headaches. Jones said she experiences delays, usually in the morning roughly once a month.
The latest incident was on Monday, when Jones says her son was never picked up for school. Jones said she and her son waited at his bus stop, which is scheduled to pick him up at 6:59 a.m., and the two were outside waiting around 6:45 a.m. She called the bus company around 7:15 a.m. and was told the bus came around 11 minutes early that morning, which she says never happened.
Jones said she received a notification around 6:50 a.m. that the bus was in their range, but it never came to their house.
“I’ve not been very pleased, they’re not very reliable,” Jones said. “I don’t know if it’s frustrating because they have to come all the way down the street and you know, actually do do curbside drop-off but I don’t care. It’s a safety issue for my son. He has curbside pickup and drop-off for a reason.”
Jones said her mother, who happened to be in town that day ended up taking her son to school hours later after the bus never showed, forcing him to miss a couple of hours of school.
Jones says she thinks on paper the app is a good idea, but still sees flaws. For instance, she said she believes the app should send notifications regardless of whether or not the app is open on a person’s phone.
“It’s kind of nice because in the afternoon it (the bus) doesn’t always drop-off at the same time, so it’s kind of nice to be able to not have to sit outside for half an hour and wait for the bus to get there,” Jones said. “It’s nice to be able to see when the bus is almost there and just head outside then but again, you have to have the app open.”
Jones said moving forward, she’d like to see the buses become more reliable and be at her house when they’re supposed to be and communicate/ fix mistakes on their end when they occur.
“Situations like Monday when the bus did not come back for my son, that’s not OK,” Jones said.
Tubbesing wasn’t aware of the new app and said he chooses to utilize “Find my iPhone” after August’s incident, saying his 8-year-old now has an iPhone for tracking purposes. The app experienced a few glitches on Wednesday while he signed up, but he still said he finds it to be helpful, in theory.
“I feel better about it because then I know exactly where the bus is at,” Tubbesing said. “The other day the roads were bad so we picked the kids up from school early ourselves but I’m sure the buses were running late that day because of traffic and bad roads and everything, so yeah, I feel good about it.”
ABC 17 News reached out to DS Bus Lines.