THUNDER BAY — For the first time this school year, all school buses in the Thunder Bay area were kept off the road Wednesday due to poor driving conditions.
The cleanup effort continues following a three-day weather event that dumped 27 to 32 cm of snow at various local monitoring stations, according to Environment Canada.
Rural schools remained closed, but urban schools were open, which left parents and students scrambling to find alternate transportation.
Companies contracted by the consortium of local school boards operate a total of 166 buses, and perform close to 700 runs to and from individual schools each day.
Craig Murphy, manager of Student Transportation Services of Thunder Bay, said discussions about whether to cancel all bus runs began about 4:30 in the morning.
In the case of rural schools, this was the third day in a row that they were affected by closures.
"Many rural areas haven't had any – or have had very little – plowing over the past few days. So, obviously there's going to be a big concern for buses being able to stay on the roads when there are no roads to drive on," Murphy said.
He explained that the decision to cancel bus runs in the city as well was made after careful consideration of the conditions.
"We were out driving around the city this morning, taking a look at the city's efforts at that point to try to get the streets cleared up. They obviously were out in full force and did an excellent job on the arterial roads. But the residential streets, where our buses spend 90 per cent of their time picking up students, are still very messy."
Murphy added: "Unfortunately, the plowing efforts on the arterial roads caused significant snow banks at the intersections of many residential streets. So with that assessment, we decided it would be in the best interest not to have our buses out today to give the city more time to clean up the mess."
He said he hopes that with the ongoing efforts of city road crews, buses will be able to operate in Thunder Bay on Thursday, but in the rural areas "we'll have to see how the various townships are able to get caught up."
Whenever they are necessary due to weather or road conditions, STSTB typically announces bus cancellations and school closures by 6:30 a.m.
More information can be found at www.ststb.ca or by phoning the snow closure line at 807-625-1661.
