ST. LOUIS — Close to 1,000 more students will be riding yellow buses to St. Louis Public Schools starting Tuesday, according to district leaders.
Administrators at SLPS have been scrambling to cover student transportation since primary bus vendor Missouri Central canceled its contract with the district in the spring. A mix of buses, taxis and rideshare cars from multiple vendors plus Metro city buses have combined to drive students in the first two weeks of school.
The hodgepodge plan has been hit or miss for reliability and safety. Parents reported that some students were stranded at their bus stops, while others were forced to sit on the floor of crowded minivan shuttles. At several schools, large yellow buses from vendor First Student were seen carrying one to four students each.
“The Transportation Department has been working to maximize the use of yellow buses for students across the school district,†from SLPS posted Saturday.
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Nearly 15,500 students qualify for transportation to the district’s 68 schools. The emergency plan for this fall included about 5,350 students assigned to traditional buses, 3,800 students with alternative vendors such as taxis and 1,660 high school students on Metro Transit buses, with the remainder opting out of transportation.
Just days before school started Aug. 19, three companies canceled their commitments of 36 buses for the district. An unknown number of students were reassigned to other providers, and some families received gas cards in lieu of transportation. Only 200 high school students rode MetroBus on the first couple days of school, transit officials said.
Square Watson, operations chief for SLPS, has not responded to questions about the number of students who have not been offered transportation, or the percentage of bus routes that have been canceled.
The transportation crisis has not had a negative effect on attendance, which has grown to between 17,000 and 18,000 students daily, acting Superintendent Millicent Borishade said Tuesday at a board meeting.
Enrollment in SLPS this year is projected to reach 19,480, a gain of about 1,150 students over 2023-2024, signaling a possible reversal of the district’s steep decline over decades.
St. Louis Public Schools spokesman George Sells responds to questions about the district's transportation crisis on August 6, 2024 outside Vashon High School. Sells left the district later that month. Video by Blythe Bernhard of the Post-Dispatch.
