South students stumble out to the bus stop before the sun rises. When their buses arrive, some are in for a long ride.

Freshman Molly Shassberger’s bus comes to her stop at 6:20 a.m. for most of the week, and at 6:45 a.m. on Wednesdays when she usually rides. She gets up at 5:30 a.m. to catch it, and usually arrives at school 20 – 30 minutes before school starts on days she takes the bus.

“I’m used to it,” Shassberger said. Her mom works at Arlington Elementary and drops her off even earlier on days she doesn’t take the bus. “I get about five hours [or] four hours of sleep.”

According to MCCSC Director of Transportation Gib Niswander, the longest bus routes in the school system are approximately one hour and 15 minutes.

“The longest routes are typically routes that travel to the far reaches of our school district,” Niswander said. “Our earliest drop off at high [or] middle school is 7:10 a.m. This is necessary for a few routes to allow those buses to travel back out into the county to start an elementary route.”

The bus driver shortage has had a major impact on bus routes according to Niswander. MCCSC custodians and other employees have been trained to drive buses, and take over routes every day.

“This obviously affects these employees’ primary job productivity. As you can see there is a domino effect across MCCSC simply due to a shortage in one position. This can also be extended to the impact on the hundreds of students late to school or home and parents who may also be late to work or other appointments simple due to the bus schedule,” he said.

Niswander said that there is no way for routes to be shortened without more drivers. MCCSC has worked with Bloomington Transit (BT) to help get students to school, and BT has added a morning route to get students to Jackson Creek Middle School. Unfortunately this services only a limited number of students.

“Bus routes are created under three limiting factors; time, distance and capacity. Shorten a route and the number of students is reduced which will require an additional bus for the remaining students. Multiply this by several dozen at best and it quickly adds up to drivers and additional expense in buses and operational costs,” he said.

MCCSC is planning on launching a “Here Comes the Bus” app to help students and parents track buses and get a more accurate picture of day to day pick up times.

For now, it seems to be a complex issue to solve.

“The bus driver shortage is a nationwide problem with some areas more severe than others. Within the transportation industry the consensus is that there are a number of issues to be addressed to effectively solve the problem over the long term. No one issue, such as wages, will solve the problem,” Niswander said.