Rising costs have impacted the purchase of new buses as well as vehicle parts for the Northern Lights Public Schools Division (NLPS).
“We have seen prices rise up to 70 per cent on new buses in the past five years,” said Nicole Garner, a spokesperson for the school division, who explained that some vehicle parts have increased in price by as much as 200-300 per cent in the same period. “All increased costs are factored into the budget as best as we are able to predict.”
According to Garner, a new 70-passenger bus comes with a price tag ranging anywhere from $165,000 to $175,000. As for what it costs to fix a bus, she added, that depends on what work needs to be done. Tires, she said, cost anywhere from $3,000-$4,000 per bus, while transmissions are $10,000 and up. Motors can be more than $30,000.
“The service bills add up quickly,” she said.
During the most recent meeting of the Northern Lights Public Schools board of trustees, Matt Richter, the director of transportation for the school division, noted that right now, in addition to prices rising, new and used buses are extremely hard to find in North America and that replacement parts are also becoming difficult to locate.
Presently, Garner said, in addition to 11 buses that are being used on routes, the school division also has some spares and a bus that is used for training purposes in the NLPS Driver Training School. She added that the school division purchases new buses when they are needed and if equipment is available.
While new buses are necessary to have in the NLPS bus fleet, even those can still break down, Garner admitted. In the event that a bus does break down and there is no spare available, then that there is no bus to cover a particular route. Furthermore, she added, such an incident might also include towing costs.
“You have to balance how much mileage and work the bus does versus the estimated cost for repairs or a new purchase,” she stated, adding that this includes the time factor for the repairs and/or ordering a new bus as well. “With some parts being scarce, it can sometimes take awhile for repairs to be completed.”