In April, it was announced that the upper secondary school students at Nybyggeskolan will no longer be allowed to take the school bus to and from school from the start of the autumn term. This applies to students living in Barkarö, Enhagen / Ekbacken, Tidö-Lindö, Örtagården and Dingtuna. The students will instead get a bus pass and travel with VL's buses.
- I feel a great concern and want the decision to be changed. Security disappears because you do not know that the children will come home after school, says parent Josefine Schwertner Eriksson who started the name collection.
Göran Thunberg, unit manager at the school transport unit in the city of Västerås, says that the department has gone backwards for many years and that they have a requirement to get the budget in balance.
- In total, the school bus costs about 60 million and we are four million back now, says Göran Thunberg.
What do you save by pulling in the school bus for the students at Nybyggeskolan?
- Preliminarily half a million kronor. This is not just what we do, but we review the entire school bus operation. Over the years, there have been rampant costs that we have to overcome, says Göran Thunberg.
The parents also point out that the change will result in long travel times and overcrowded buses in corona time.
- The change is made in the middle of an ongoing pandemic that is expected to have a new wave of infections this autumn. With the decision, the students will be exposed to possible infection at four different times a day when they have to change buses on the way to and from school. When the students ride the school bus, the passengers they ride with are an isolated group that for the most part belongs to their own school, says Josefine Schwertner Eriksson.