The Town Courier: MCPS Checks Lakelands Bus Routes

MCPS Checks Lakelands Bus Routes

October 12, 2010

By Krista Brick

Montgomery County school officials may check to make sure students are eligible to ride school buses after some concern about crowded buses.

Parents with kids getting picked up at two stops in Lakelands got letters recently reminding them that only students outside the designated walk area may catch a ride to Rachel Carson Elementary School...

 ,,,“The trigger was the bus outside of the Lakelands. If there were a large number of non-eligible transported students, we could then shift our resources using this bus to help out the other bus serving outside the Lakelands and the possibility of combining both into one bus,” he said.

In evaluating the stops, Punturiero said he wanted to get an accurate count of who was riding the bus but should actually have been walking to school.

“We sent out a general letter that stated if you live within the walk boundary, you are a walker. That created an uproar in the community,” Punturiero said.

After getting complaints from parents, Punturiero personally visited the bus stops on two occasions. Each time he said the buses had an adequate number of seats to accommodate the students...