New technological advances and updates are being made to improve the safety of students on Bellevue Public Schools (BPS) buses.

Changes to the 9-year contract from First Student caused BPS transportation to switch to Student Transportation of America (STA) in the middle of the school year. First Student increased the cost per bus per day from $7 to $46, which required BPS to look for a cheaper contract and STA offered better pricing. The new contract also includes new bus drivers, creating confusion for some students.

“We had a guy that was on and off for a week and then was just not there anymore and then we had another person and after a month or so a lady came up and now she’s the bus driver now,” senior Dashaun Torry said.

STA is not the only change; there has been a purchase of more buses, as the decision to go from diesel to propane buses. The three buses that were purchased in February are propane buses.

“There are a lot of reasons to go propane and the propane industry has really been promoting propane buses and the issues with emissions with diesel engines has been an ongoing issue for us and with any school district,” Director of Transportation Rich Casey said. “Diesel engines require a lot of emissions equipment because EPA regulations steadily increased and become harsher since 2014, so with those additional emissions equipment, diesel engines don’t work so well on school buses.”

Money is being spent on diesel buses to repair them and the emissions equipment. Diesel buses are challenging to run during the winter.

“Diesel is expensive and they require to be plugged in the winter time and they don’t start so well when it’s cold out and we bring in a crew on cold mornings to start diesel buses to make sure kids don’t get left standing on the side of the street,” Casey said.

There are alternative buses in the area that are being sold and have fewer issues with maintenance and cost.

“All of our 81 buses are currently diesel. With all those issues, we looked at alternatives, and there’s a lot of alternatives to diesel buses like electric school buses, gasoline, compressed natural gas, and then propane,” Casey said.

Propane buses cost a little more than diesel, but run quieter, are cleaner, and cost less to maintain.  There is no emission equipment on propane buses.

“If you ride a bus you’ll be amazed at the difference of propane and diesel. You can actually hear yourself talk over the engine and so there are a lot of reasons to go propane and we are excited to start down that road,” Casey said.

With the new buses, there is new technology on them as well, including cameras on the stop arms and in the buses.

“I don’t think we should have voice recording, but cameras are fine because we do need that information just in case something does happen on the bus so we can prove something because the bus driver can’t see anything,” Torry said.

After analyzing the costs and benefits, the superintendent and Casey make the decision to make a switch with First Student to STA during the middle of the school year before second semester started.

“It’s been a smooth transition and we are super pleased with STA, but we will save $11,000 just this second semester by switching to this other contract with STA and we will save $22,000 next year,” Casey said.