Three years ago, the P.E.I. government rolled out its new electric school buses with much fanfare.
Now some drivers say the buses are plagued with problems, with 16 to 18 of the vehicles in the shop at a time on occasions, out of a total of just over 100.
Robert Geiss, president of CUPE Local 1145, which represents school bus drivers on the Island, says he believes the provincial government rushed into buying the new buses — and now students and drivers are paying the price.
He said the biggest problems are with the heating systems, leaving some buses icy cold and leading to windows fogging and freezing up. There also are issues with air compressors freezing, which can interfere with braking, Geiss said during an interview with CBC News.
Spare buses are also in short supply, Geiss said, because so many of the province’s electric buses are in the shop.
“The drivers are frustrated with the electric buses. There’s about 16 per cent of them in the shop at any given time with issues,” said Geiss, who drives an electric school bus in the Summerside area.
“I took a band trip up, and on the way back, I realized I wasn’t going to make it. I radioed the depot and they met me at another driver’s home that had a charger…. We just swapped out buses and I continued on with the diesel bus and left the electric there to charge.”
‘I’d need 4 electric buses each way’
School branch officials admit range is an issue. For now, they will plan to use diesel buses for longer trips.
The Public School Branch plans to install Level 3 fast chargers at all its high schools soon, and intends to roll those chargers out to all schools “eventually.”
In the meantime, Geiss said he fears students will either miss out on some extracurricular activities, like end-of-school-year trips, or the province may end up outsourcing the transportation, which he said would be unfair to the students and drivers alike.
“They are going to have to start buying either hybrids or some fossil-fuel buses as support because, as I said, we’ve got Island-wide tournaments. If I had to take a team from Westisle down to Souris, I’d need four electric buses each way to make the trip.”
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