Going to and from school is a daily transport made by millions of children within Europe [1]. The number of children going to and from school with school transport vary between countries; in Sweden for example, having 9.2 million inhabitants, the number of children in school transportation aged 6–16 is estimated to be some quarter of a million [2]. Consequently, these frequent school related journeys put a significant pressure on society to guarantee that they are safe and secure [3].
School children are victims as they use bus transports to and from school [3–5], e.g., 9 children were fatally injured, 62 severely injured and 338 slightly injured in Sweden in 2003–2006 as a result of their school transports [6]. Children are generally less cautious than adults [7, 8], and cannot be expected to completely follow any rules set up in school transportation [9]. Instead they need routines, i.e., “...an executable capability for repeated performance in some context that been learned by an organization in response to selective processes” (p. 683) [10]. Deviations from routines in school bus travels have been shown to be crucial for incidents to take place [9]. Furthermore, crash investigations have proven the majority (64%) of the children injured in school bus related crashes to be struck when they walked or ran out behind or in front of their bus, especially in the afternoon [11] (Fig. 1). The most dangerous situations are on the way to or from the bus stop and when children wait there, not while being in the bus [6]. Surprisingly, the median age of the children injured or killed in school bus related crashes was found to be 12–13 years [11]. Apparently, age alone does not seem to lower the risk of being injured in school transportation. Unfortunately there is a lack of door-to-door perspective in crash statistics and there are no such EU-based statistics available [12].
Despite the fact that only five scientific evaluations of support systems for school transportation have been performed between 1999 and 2005 [13–17], the EU-report “Road safety in school transport” [1] suggests several measures to increase safety for children. None of them were, however, directly linked to increased implementation of routines into school transportation. Hence, current safety and security policies lack sufficient scientific support.
Based on pilot trials [13] and then implemented in two buses in 2008, off-the-shelf technology was used to create driver support systems that supposedly raised the level of routines in school transportation in Sweden [18]. With a clear door-to-door perspective [19] the driver support system had GPS based navigation to track bus stops linked to pre-specified children and specific information about every child. The two buses were equipped with communication devices to be used at the bus stops, seat belt usage detection systems and camera surveillance both inside and outside the bus. The buses were also fitted with extra internal and external mirrors, additional interior and exterior illumination at the rear doors, external loudspeakers, seat belt reminder stickers, security cards similar to the ones used in commercial aviation and booster cushions.
More in detail, the on-board computers contained the following components:
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Route and navigation information
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Intelligent Speed Adaptation (ISA)
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GPS based bus stop information
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Information about each child scheduled to travel with the bus
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Pre-recorded announcements for passengers getting off the bus
As part of the implementation, educational and training sessions for the drivers were carried out. During the journey, the bus driver was given information about the route with help of a navigation system. When the driver was in the vicinity of 100–200 m of the bus stop, a picture was displayed of the actual bus stop (Fig. 2). To the right on the screen, the driver was provided information about the bus’ speed and the actual speed limit. If the driver exceeded the speed limit he or she was given a visual and auditory warning signal. The name of the next bus stop and the time the bus was expected to arrive were also displayed.
At the bus stop, a sensor registered children on the bus or in the vicinity of it. The driver support system showed children expected to board the bus and if they were at the bus stop by different frame colours on the child’s photo. The children’s names were also displayed.
The driver could get more information about a child by activating the child’s name on the screen, e.g., contact details of parents/guardians and school staff. If the parents so desired, any special needs of their child were also displayed. When a child alightened the bus, the driver was presented with the same information about the child as when he/she boarded the bus, supplemented with information about whether he/she usually alighted at the front or the rear entrance of the bus and if the child needed to be accompanied across the road. As the children left the bus, they were logged off automatically. In the same way, the children were logged on automatically when they boarded the bus for their homeward bound journey. However, log on and off could be done manually by the driver, as well. When the bus approached a bus stop, the driver support system also provided the children information by playing a pre-recorded audio file that told them the name of the next bus stop and who were scheduled to get off, in addition to safety instructions. The driver could at any time quickly get an overview of the children on board. Running light warning systems were installed at two bus stops with speed limit 50 km/h (Ripa) and 70 km/h (Nymö) to warn other road-users of the presence of the children (Fig. 3, right). From a distance of 100 m the running lights were activated by the each of the 130 participating children’s tag (Fig. 3, left). Consequently, the driver could see whether or not the children were in the vicinity of 100 m from the bus stop as he/she approached it.
Given this implementation, the aim of the present pilot study was to explore possible safety and security gains from the driver support systems integrated with intelligent bus stops from a safety and security aspect. The exploration was based on the assumptions that underlie the creation of the system, viz.:
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i,
Lower speeds of other road users in the area of the bus stop lead to fewer crashes and less severe crashes.
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ii,
Implementation of strict routines leads to fewer crashes.
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iii,
Enhanced possibilities to discover potential hazards and intervene accordingly leads to fewer crashes.
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iv,
Increased security and less stress in the children leads to fewer crashes.