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New bus routes coming together for district |
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Local Content -
Local News
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Written by Larry McGuire
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Tuesday, 30 June 2009 |
PUNXSUTAWNEY — Cheryl Repik, Punxsutawney Area School District transportation director, said at Monday's School Board meeting that she has completed a large portion of the new bus routes for the 2009-2010 school year by utilizing Versa-Tran, a computer bus routing system.
"All drivers will receive route sheets which includes the directions, stops, kids, times and what school they are at," she said. "We have the bus runs printed out and broken down by schools. My hope was to get each run down between 45 minutes and an hour."
Repik said for the most part, she has been able to achieve that.
"The longest run is one hour and six minutes," Repik said.
Dr. J. Thomas Frantz, district superintendent, said Repik has been working on the bus schedules for two months.
"Cheryl has a very good plan in place," Frantz said. "Although it will need refined for the elementary bus routes, she is looking for all routes to be no longer than one hour."
Frantz said realistically, the Punxsy district covers a very large geographic area, and someone has to be the first one on the bus every morning.
"Cheryl has taken the Mary A. Wilson buses and used them in the elementary runs," Frantz said. "She has taken an extra bus that we had in the Big Run area for the elementary runs. We have to keep in mind that we are moving K-5 elementary runs back to K-6, so you have another grade of children to pick up."
Frantz said the high school runs will go from 6-12 to 7-12.
"You have one less grade to be transported," Frantz said. "Right now, she has the bus routes completed, the times worked out, some suggestions for the board to consider and then it will be finalized.
"In early August, we will be able to send letters to all the parents that will indicate their bus route, number, times and so forth," he said. "It will be similar to what we did when the board closed Big Run and Banks Canoe elementary schools about five or six years ago."
Repik also gave the board an update on the movement of the school speed limit flashing signs from in front of Mary A. Wilson School on East Mahoning Street to North Findley Street in front of the high school.
"I met with PennDOT, which informed us that there has to be a written plan submitted by the district before PennDOT will approve the switch," Repik said. "Ben White, Punxsutawney Borough manager, suggested the EADS Group, which is the engineering company the borough uses for its projects."
Repik received a proposal in the amount of $4,500 from EADS to prepare a plan for moving the flashing signs.
Kirby Starr, Punxsy School Board president who also works for PennDOT, said PennDOT used to perform this work, and that he was going to research why it no longer does it. Repik said PennDOT will give you a template to do the plan, which can be attained at its Web site.
"Anderson Electric gave us a quote of $7,380 to actually move the signal to its new location," she said. "That does not include any fees from Penelec, which could be up to $500 per location, which would total $1,000 to do the hook ups."
Frantz said the issue is that the district would like to move the lights, and there has never been any flashing speed limit signs on North Findley Street.
"Cheryl has spent a lot of time on this," he said. "Obviously, if it's $7,000, we'll need to get additional quotes."
Frantz said there will be a crossing guard at the corner of North Findley Street and Sycamore Street.
"We would feel more comfortable if we had the flashing sign there, too," Frantz said. Repik said the flashing sign would be installed near Johnston Furniture.
"The other blinking light would go 250 feet down the hill heading toward Walston," she said. "We needed to keep both signs in the borough. We could've put them as far apart as our current signs are, but the one is located in Young Township, and we didn't want to involve two municipalities. The flashing signs will be 1,300 feet apart, and legally, they can be 1,800 feet apart."
Frantz said the district asked the borough to leave the signs where they are.
"The borough owns the signs, and will take them down and store them," Frantz said.
Repik said White said the borough is not willing to pay to move the signs.
Starr assigned the matter to the transportation committee to investigate.
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Last Updated ( Wednesday, 01 July 2009 )
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