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On April 15, 2002, the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reissued
a cautionary warning to users of fifteen-passenger vans. The agency notified
consumers of an increased rollover risk under certain conditions. A similar
warning was issued in May of 2001, when the NTSB warned motorists that
fifteen-passenger vans with ten or more occupants are three times as likely
to roll over in crashes than fifteen-passenger vans that are lightly loaded.
Despite the agency’s efforts last year to warn the public about the vehicles’
handling characteristics, accidents involving fifteen-passenger vans have
continued. Most recently in April 2002, a fifteen-passenger van carrying
day-care clients drifted off a Memphis interstate into a highway overpass
killing four young passengers. While alleged drug usage by the driver
appears to be an issue in this accident, public and media focus on the
use of these large vans is intense.
States are translating the NTSB position on fifteen-passenger vans in
a variety of ways. Some states have already outlawed the use of fifteen-passenger
vans to pick up and drop off children. Because these vans have constituted
the major transportation fleet for many camps, the decision-making process
related to the need to potentially replace these vehicles is an important
concern for camp directors. In the following round table discussion, three
camp directors from various parts of the country answer questions about
how their camps are facing this transportation dilemma and what they are
doing or plan to do to address the issue and ensure the safety of their
campers. The American Camping Association (ACA) suggests that all camp
directors investigate their state regulations on transportation particularly
for fifteen-passenger vans and contact their insurance brokers to determine
insurance requirements.
States are beginning to prohibit by law the use of fifteen-passenger
vans because of safety issues. How vital to the day-to-day running of
your camp is this type of vehicle?
Don Gentle — Our program is very trip intensive and relies on
these vans for transportation into wilderness access areas where a bus
is not appropriate. We run two to five trips out per day using these vans.
They are the perfect size when you are only sending ten to twelve campers,
which fit most of the fifteen-person limits (including staff) imposed
by National Forest areas.
Harold Gordon — For more than twenty years, we have considered
these vans to be an essential component of our camp transportation program.
Last summer our daily camp transportation included approximately fifty
of these vans each day to provide door-to-door transportation for our
campers and staff. We also used two to three of them a few days each week
for small-group, off-site programs.
Steve Schainman — We don’t have any fifteen-passenger vans for
transporting children because New York State does not permit them to be
used to pick up or drop off children along “public highways;” i.e., public
roads. They do not qualify as a school bus or type of vehicle that New
York’s Department of Transportation inspectors are permitted to inspect.
I also agree that they are not as safe as the ones which we use — the
more strongly built yellow school bus vans that are complete with school
bus signs, flashing school bus lights, and stop signs that swing out when
the passenger door is opened — requiring motorists to stop, etc. I am
referring to vehicles with adult capacities of eight to ten passengers
or child capacities of sixteen to twenty. I know of a day camp that uses
the fifteen-passenger vans for point-to-point or parking lot-to-parking
lot transportation of campers. Many New York State resident camps use
them similarly, for example, when one camp brings its basketball team
to another camp for a game. A few day camps continue to use them illegally
for door-to-door transportation, having gotten around the restriction
by picking up or dropping off in driveways of campers’ homes.
Even if your state has not made the use of this vehicle
illegal, do you plan to take or have you already taken any proactive steps
to initiate alternative transportation for your campers?
Harold Gordon — Yes, we already took steps for this summer. Actually,
we began thinking about this prior to last summer. Our initial thought
was to convert to nineteen-passenger school buses, but still utilize our
camp staff as drivers. This would have provided us with the safety of
the school bus, while allowing us to continue to offer door-to-door transportation.
Since California requires commercial driver’s licenses (CDLs)for the fifteen-passenger
vans, we would have been able to continue the training that we had been
doing and actually been able to use fewer vehicles and fewer camp drivers.
That was a welcome thought. Following last summer we decided, however,
to do a more complete analysis of the ways in which we could further enhance
the safety of our campers and staff while in transit. We decided that
a second major element after the vehicle was the driver. We have always
used our camp staff as our camp drivers. Like most camps, our staff is
mostly college age. To be a driver in addition to their “in camp” job,
staff members have been required to have clean driving records, go through
our classroom and behind the wheel training program, and pass the required
written and driving tests for their commercial driver’s license. Over
the many years, our staff has done a good job for us in this extremely
important role. However, as we did our evaluation, we came to realize
that for as good a job as they have done, they were still relatively young
drivers with very little experience driving larger vehicles. There is
no substitute for experience, and so it was with this in mind and with
the knowledge that school buses provide a significantly higher degree
of safety, that we have made the decision to contract out our entire bussing
program to Atlantic Express Transportation Group.
Steve Schainman — This question doesn’t really apply to us, because
our state has already taken action. We have been using a dozen mini-vans,
capable of carrying seven passengers — children or adults — in addition
to the driver. New York State’s DOT inspectors will inspect them, and
we are permitted to use them for our door-to-door pickup. They qualify
because they have capacities of less than eight passengers. Additionally,
the DOT requires that the sliding door and frame have contacts that connect
electrically to the dashboard, where a read light will flash if the door
is even slightly ajar. Some models have this feature built in. The vans
we use require this installation along with a 2½- to 3-inch diameter red
bulb fixture mounted on the dashboard. We are also required to have a
fire extinguisher, first-aid kit, and reflectors mounted typically behind
the rear seat. Also, magnetic decals giving the camp’s corporate name
plus decals designating the number given by the DOT to the vehicle must
be displayed on the van’s exterior. The limited capacity of these vehicles
makes them expensive to operate.
Don Gentle — North Carolina is on the edge of making these vans
illegal, though nothing has happened yet. We have looked into using the
fifteen-passenger “mini busses,” which some of the camps in the area use,
at least partially. That will probably be our answer, but at a much greater
expense than renting fifteen-passenger vans. It’s about $125-$175 more
a month to rent these buses.
How has losing/will losing this type of transportation
affect your camp?
Harold Gordon — There is a very significant cost differential
between utilizing our own drivers with owned and leased vehicles versus
contracting out for vehicles with drivers. To continue to offer door-to-door
transportation utilizing the contracted services would have nearly tripled
transportation costs. In order to make this change and not significantly
increase these costs for our families, we made the decision to continue
to offer local neighborhood transportation from over sixty different meeting
points on sixteen different routes in place of door-to-door transportation.
With the decision, we have been working hard to educate our parents about
the importance of this decision and the value of trading convenience for
significantly enhanced safety. Having said that, it is important to realize
that for most of our families, their meeting point is within two to four
minutes of their homes. Less than 5 percent of our camp families will
have to travel more than five minutes to reach a bus stop.
Don Gentle — We’re not quite sure yet — the biggest problem would
be orienting and training staff to use the new vehicles as well as trailers
on Forest Service roads. It does not appear to me at this time that there
would be many changes for our camp regarding pickup and delivery policies.
Steve Schainman — I don’t think that whatever happens with prohibiting
this type of vehicle will have a great bearing on our camp or most other
private camps. Not-for-profits that use them may encounter a hardship,
especia1ly if they are located in areas where the other alternative school
bus vans are all owned by school districts and hence are not available
to be rented or leased for the summer to outside organizations — or, the
private bus companies in their areas are unwilling to lease or rent them
without their own drivers. In the greater New York Metropolitan area,
there are still a number of bus companies who will lease school bus vans
for the summer permitting the camps’ personnel to drive them. As compared
to providing company drivers, this is by far the less expensive means
of operation — saving from $1500-$2500 or more per vehicle in costs for
the summer. Most private camps in Westchester and nearby Rockland counties
no longer use counselor/drivers or others whom they hire to drive. The
reasons include the difficulties in training drivers to get their CDLs,
arranging for written and especially road tests, servicing buses or vans,
providing substitute drivers, arranging for parking vehicles overnight,
etc. As for pickup and delivery, there is no change contemplated for my
camp or others that I know of. I love Harold’s new use of pickup points
and full-size school buses, but I don’t think we could get away with it.
There are some parkways around here that will not permit large buses to
travel on them. Moreover, we in private camping in this area are still
convinced that we could not get away with this compromise of services.
Yet, I wonder. Our nursery school and kindergarten of 200 plus campers
has most of their transportation provided by parents.
Will the loss of fifteen-passenger vans reduce or prevent
out of camp trips?
Harold Gordon — No. We will be keeping some of the buses and some
of the drivers with us each day in order to provide emergency evacuation
transportation. We will also use these drivers to ferry campers to our
off-site locations, which are just five to ten minutes from camp.
Steve Schainman — This isn’t a concern for us either. We have
the buses and vans to provide out-of-camp trips.
Don Gentle — Tripping is a considerable part of our program. We
will have to “roll with the changes” regarding this matter if it does
become law in North Carolina.
How are you budgeting for replacing this type of transportation?
Don Gentle — We’ll probably have to go to mini-vans, but haven’t
done the budgeting for this yet.
Harold Gordon — As I mentioned before, the cost to contract out
full transportation and operate sixteen school bus routes is approximately
the same as running fifty-six smaller routes on our own. However, because
we want to have emergency transportation available during the day and
plan to provide all sixty plus of our bus counselors with their own Nextel
radios for emergency communication before and after buses arrive at meeting
points, our costs may actually be 5 percent to 7 percent higher. We have
chosen to absorb these costs as a cost of making this change.
Are you requiring additional training for your staff
drivers beyond a CDL?
Steve Schainman — Aside from the twelve min-vans we use with our
own drivers, all others are bus company employees. We have an outside
driving school come in for a four-hour training session for our mini-van
drivers. These drivers don’t require a CDL.
Originally published in the 2002 July/August
issue of Camping Magazine.
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