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Transit Tangents
The Podcast where we discuss all things transit. Join us as we dive into transit systems across the US, bring you interviews with experts and advocates, and engage in some fun and exciting challenges along the way.
Transit Tangents
Ep. 46: The School Bus - Expert Interview with AISD
Explore the evolving landscape of student transportation with insights from Kris Hafezizadeh, a seasoned expert with over two decades of experience at Austin Independent School District. Kris delves into the unique challenges facing school transportation today—from cost disparities to complex logistical issues—while sharing a forward-looking vision that prioritizes safety and embraces the shift toward electric school buses.
Doors are closing Public transit. That's my way to roll On the metro. I'm taking control. Bus stops, train tracks it's my daily grind.
Speaker 2:Transit is the rhythm of my life.
Speaker 3:School districts across the nation are facing an uncertain future as cities expand and budgets tighten. In this episode, we visit the Austin Independent School District to see how their student transit services are adapting to this new reality. It's time for a transit tangents safety announcement.
Speaker 2:With our students, with our families. I do want to ask them that please ask your students when they're on the bus, put on those lap shoulder belts the same as you do when they get in your passenger car. And when they're in the bus, tell them please obey the driver, the safety rules don't stand up, put your hand out the window. So we have our safety guidelines also on our transportation website with the district. Please make sure you all read that and follow that.
Speaker 3:Welcome back everybody to this episode of Transit Tangents. My name is Chris and I'm Lewis, and today we are at the Austin Independent School District's Southern Bus Terminal. Here are the very special guests Chris Hapazizadeh Thank you so much for being here this morning.
Speaker 2:Thanks so much for having me and welcome to our district, welcome to our bus terminal. This is one of the three that we have.
Speaker 3:Yeah, so just starting off, easy question right off the top. You know you've been in this position for a little bit of time. Is what you're telling me? How many?
Speaker 2:years.
Speaker 3:I've been here now 21 years 21 years, which is really impressive tenure.
Speaker 2:Well, thank you.
Speaker 3:Over that time? How have you seen ridership in the district change and can you tell us any sort of things that factor into those trends and ridership?
Speaker 2:Sure, well, basically, on average, we transport 20,000 students per day, right, that's to and from a school. That doesn't even include after-school activities, field trips, athletics, things like that With the exception, of course, the COVID years when we were, you know, when we had education for our students remotely, when we had education for our students remotely and other than that, about 20,000 students per day. So there are many factors that we have ridership, right. We provide service based on our transportation approved policy. Who is eligible? Our district has 73,000 students. Out of the 73,000, about 36,000 are eligible for transportation. Out of that, then, not all students ride school buses, for many reasons they may have, so we transport 20,000 of those every day, right.
Speaker 1:I'm curious, like from before COVID to now, was that number, do you think, higher than the 20,000 before COVID? Unless kids are riding the bus today, or has it kind of been about the same?
Speaker 2:Well, it is a little bit lower because about 10, 12 years ago our district had like 86,000 students. At this time we are about 73,000 students.
Speaker 1:Okay, so number of students has gone down in general as well.
Speaker 2:Yes, when your enrollment goes down of course does affect many other things, including transportation, right, but at this time we are still sitting about 20,000 per day, gotcha.
Speaker 1:And then you said roughly 36,000 were kind of eligible of the 70,000 or so. Is the eligibility in a sense of just like physical locations, like if some people live far enough away are they not eligible, or is it the opposite, almost like kids who live within a mile of a school or something along those lines?
Speaker 2:We have two policies. Who can be eligible? Right, and we have all this information also on our website, austin ISD. First, to be eligible for transportation, you've got to live two or more miles from your neighborhood attendance. You know area of school Number two if you live less than two miles and your walk to the school is hazardous, then you become eligible. Now, this is the policy for our students. We also provide other services, ie for our special educational students, per their program. They need to be provided. We import them and we provide as required. We do also have some trips that we may go to the school districts around us Per McKinney-Winto federal law for our homeless students. We also have those programs as well, that they are legally eligible.
Speaker 1:I'm just imagining that you all have some really fun maps when you're like planning all of these routes in the beginning of the year. If, like these people are in, these people are out, I just I feel like those maps are probably pretty fun.
Speaker 2:Well, actually, you know, when I started, I started in, you know, transportation back in 1989. I don't think any of you guys were I wasn't born yet, yeah. That's what we did with pencil and maps.
Speaker 2:Yeah well, we don't do it like that right, right right we have a very, very nice technology like it's an automated system Yep. We have a transportation software that we are able to import all the students' data into our transportation software nightly, so when the scheduler goes to work in the morning they can see who's eligible, who's not eligible and route accordingly. And that also helps us us, other than being effective, it keeps you to be efficient. So they know, so they can figure out not to add a brand new route which is very costly. See if they can work like a chess game to see how to move things around, to make sure we can provide the service for our kids at the same time, keep us efficient.
Speaker 3:Are those routes electronically transmitted to the drivers in the bus, or how is that information conveyed to the driver?
Speaker 2:Well, two ways. One for all of our special education buses is exactly that. We have tablets installed on those. When the scheduler creates those routes automatically overnight, not at the same time overnight gets imported, exported to those tablets inside of each special ed buses. I can take you to one. You can take a picture. Yeah, on our general education routes, on on a few of them we have that technology. On most of them we don't, because it is also costly, right?
Speaker 1:And I would imagine on the general education ones the routes don't change as much, I would imagine.
Speaker 2:You're exactly correct. Seems like you know some stuff. You're exactly correct. Seems like you know some stuff. You're exactly correct. So we do it based on still some technology involved. So we have a main office where I am. We have all of our main office schedulers, our payroll team and everyone. From there. The terminals do not create routes, they do not adjust routes. It's all central. So from there, when the scheduler updates or creates or edits any routes, they send it to our terminals. From there they process to make sure driver receive them, because we got to give enough time for our families to be notified. And then it happens Right and it's been going well. There is hiccups always, but we work on those hiccups and then it happens Right.
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Speaker 3:So the bus program for AISD. It's a pretty large program. We're talking about 116 schools, I think, in the district. How many buses are in the fleet?
Speaker 2:Well, we have 551 buses and out of those 551, 38 of them are a small, what we call them 14 passenger activity buses that I allow coaches to use those for the small teams. It doesn't need commercial license, it just needs a state of Texas certification and also the annual physical of Texas certification and also the annual physical. So the rest of them, we have like 308 routes at this time.
Speaker 3:AM and PM and the rest are spares. With such a large system and all the moving parts, what are some of the major challenges that you face sort of on a day-to-day basis in managing that system?
Speaker 2:Austin traffic is number one. It is absolutely crazy. Construction, of course I'm sure you're all aware, construction on RH35, we are very happy with it that within five, six years, when it's all done, it'll be awesome construction in the Oak Hill area 290 and the 71 area. We have many routes over there. Number the number one thing for the whole school district, not only for transportation, is our funding right. We are in a deficit. So one of the biggest challenges we have that Austin ISD pays the highest recapture back to the state.
Speaker 3:For those of you not from Texas, recapture refers to a funding mechanism where the state can redistribute funds from wealthier school districts to those that are less affluent.
Speaker 2:All right. We pay about 700 million every year back to the state, which is about almost almost half of our total revenue. So there are many funding challenges at this time and our and our district looking into different strategies to offset our cost, our deficit you mentioned.
Speaker 1:Uh, like, obviously the bus is dealing with traffic, but obviously one way to just help alleviate traffic in general is actually to have more kids riding the school bus, something that I see quite a bit when I'm out around town and we've actually had someone come up and ask us, like you should do an episode just about this. But it feels like more and more parents are actually driving their kids to school and you see these I'm sure you've seen them them like crazy school drop off and pick up lines and processes and this is going to make me I don't know like when I, when I was a kid, like I feel like way less kids were were driven to school. I don't remember that being a thing. Like I remember reading I think I sent you an article. It was something like nine or ten percent of of morning commute traffic in general is from parents driving their kids to school.
Speaker 2:That's true.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's true, that's a crazy number when you think about it.
Speaker 2:As I said, about 50% of our total population of the students are eligible for transportation. Our policy is also based on the funding formula from Texas Education Agency, the funding formula from Texas Education Agency. Anything outside of those funding formulas it needs to come from the district. So at this time, because of the deficit and many other things, that's what we are capable to do. But your point is very valid because we do have so, other than the traffic.
Speaker 2:So what happens in the afternoons? In the morning they said drop and go. In the afternoon, what happens? We have line of cars. Of course, in the 100 degree they still got to have their car on which you're idling. It's not good for the environment in front of our schools, other than the traffic aspect of it. With the traffic situation with the schools, my department, our district police and we have a safety team that we go talk to the principal for different strategies that we are able to do, like changing the direction of travel between parents and buses and walkers and bikers to see how we can help with that. But changing the formula of providing transportation. It will add more to our budget at this time. So we always have been hopeful that the formula of transportation for providing funding can be changed.
Speaker 1:Now, that makes sense. One example, yeah.
Speaker 2:One example my budget is about 40 million. We get about 5.8 million from the state, so about 35 comes directly from the district Right. Right35 million comes directly from the district.
Speaker 1:Right, right, no, that makes sense. And you mentioned too, I mean the, and I want to tie in the electric buses here in a second. We have one behind us. But you mentioned all the. You know cars having to sit there in the air, you know in their air conditioning idling. So obviously you've got the environmental factors there. It also can be dangerous for kids who are walking or biking to school if you're navigating a sea of parking. You know cars parked all over the road, people pulling in and out, which is a safety issue. On the environmental end, you've been adding electric buses to the fleet. We're in an area right now where there's a couple chargers. You can see one right over Chris's shoulder. Here We'll definitely get some more stuff yeah that's really showing it off.
Speaker 1:Can you talk about how the implementation of some of the electric buses has gone and some of the kind of positives and maybe negatives that you found, as you're kind of moving into trying electric buses?
Speaker 2:Well, the idea of electric buses, of course, there is no question. They are zero emission, so they're the cleanest method of transportation, right? No question on that. With every new technology there's pros and cons, right? So we are at the earliest stage of electric school buses. The same thing for electric transit buses. The same challenges Charging, yep and also the range With these buses.
Speaker 2:With the electric buses we are getting now about 60, 70 miles per day on a full charge. On a diesel bus I can get over 200 miles. So the challenge on that, I cannot use them on field trips, athletic trips, especially out of town. So there has been some mechanical issues, mechanical issues. But, as I said, with every new technology there is going to be hiccups. So that's why we planned on to do three of them as a pilot and we are planning at this time to purchase 17 more to put it at different terminals. Right? So the ideas are great. But number one thing for a school bus industry is what that 6 am? That bus better be there to pick up those students from the side of the road. Absolutely doesn't matter your diesel, doesn't matter your what or what. We owe it to our students and family that kid get to school on time, right so? But we are trying. We're trying to see is that the thing of the future, right? Yeah, I don't know that answer right now. Right, so that's where we are.
Speaker 1:And it's interesting too. You mentioned, like obviously, answer right now, right, so that's where we are. And it's interesting too. You mentioned, like obviously you all do a similar thing, but with there's a lot of different intricacies, like Cap Metro is working on. You know they have their own electric buses and for them, I would imagine, some of the challenges are different, because they're trying to have buses run the same route all day long, whereas on your end it's like you know you have a fixed route, you know you're going to do it. You know I'm simplifying this, I'm sure, but you're going to do that route. Once in the morning, once in the afternoon the bus can come back and charge in between. You know, once the range and the you know the mechanical stuff is all figured out, it feels like it could be almost a better solution for school buses than it might be for a transit agency.
Speaker 2:But obviously, but obviously, there are still plenty of challenges that you all are dealing with. Well, yes and no. Yeah, here's why because even during the midday, so we have 308 312 I said am and pm routes. During the mid year we do about 7,500 athletics field trips. Our athletic field trips, especially during football season, they go till midnight.
Speaker 1:Right, and they probably go long distances too.
Speaker 2:Because, like say, we have our big high schools, when they take their players, their band and stuff, we've got to provide like 25 buses, right 20?
Speaker 1:buses.
Speaker 2:So the fear would be it's just that If the electric bus does not have enough range, then we've got issues there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah we got issues there.
Speaker 2:Um, in the long term the technologies could be at the stadiums, have charging stations, right, um, things like that. When, um, the other biggest challenge is the cost of electric bus is $400,000. The cost of a diesel bus is $140,000. So the funding on that is huge. Yeah, there are grants available, but even with the grant we got from Feds, it covers only 50%.
Speaker 1:And in time I would imagine those numbers start to level out as electric buses become more widespread, but I mean in the future too. It really feels like I mean, you're still making a big impact by having a chunk of your fleet become electric and still having diesel buses for those long haul routes and everything. But I'd imagine it's, it's nice to have all of the buses be the same for maintenance purposes too. So you know, it's all that sort of stuff.
Speaker 2:Well, you know. So I've been in transportation now 35, 36 years. I do have a handful of years left, but still I love Austin. It doesn't matter if I'm here or not. I do want to see when I'm 80 years old at a golf course. I do want to see still school buses rolling, yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's just that, it's just the care for Austin as a whole, as a community, as a service to our students. What's the right thing to do? Absolutely, and that's what we're trying.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I also love this topic because this is sort of an introduction to transit for kids. Like that, this was. I grew up in Alabama. This was, this was transit. To me, this is the only experience I had with any type of transit where I grew up.
Speaker 1:Right, you didn't have a city bus. No, there was no city bus, there was no train, there was no other way to get around Wow what town were you in?
Speaker 3:I was outside of Mobile, alabama, pretty small area. But yeah, this was my intro to transit and I think what really kind of got me interested in it and then that interest grew over time.
Speaker 1:So this is awesome thank you again so much for taking the time. This is a great conversation. Is there anything else you you think you want to hit that that we might have missed, or uh?
Speaker 2:well, one of the safety aspects for us is just. That is just with our students, with our families. I do want to ask them that please ask your students when they're on the bus, put on those lap shoulder belts the same as you do when they get in your passenger car. And when they're in the bus, tell them please obey the driver, the safety rules, don't stand up, put your hand out the window. So we have our safety guidelines also on our transportation website with the district. Please make sure you all read that and follow that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, awesome, well. Thank you all so much. And follow that. Yeah, awesome, well. Uh, thank you all so much for walking, watching, not walking. Thank you all so much for watching.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for taking the time too thank you and uh, yeah, we really appreciate it all right all right, so huge thank you to everyone at austin isd uh in their engagement department, and to chris and uh, if you have not liked the video already or left a comment, please do so.
Speaker 1:Also, if you want to support the show, the best way to do so is on Patreon. Lots of different options to choose from there, and we provide all sorts of different things, from early episodes, ad-free episodes, extra bonus content, access to our members-only Discord server and a whole lot more. But without further ado, thank you all so much for watching and enjoy the rest of your Transit Tangents Tuesday. Hey everybody and welcome to this episode of Transit Tangents. My name is Chris.
Speaker 3:Wow, I can't believe it. What? Wow, I can't believe I did that. What?
Speaker 1:The intro really messes with me. Now I can't. I have a hard time with it.
Speaker 3:That was funny. Oh my god, that was really funny.