The problem of this study was to evaluate the quality of service and the adequacy of financial support by the State of the Texas public school transportation system and to indicate what improvements, if any, are needed in order to met ideal standards.

In this study an attempt is made to determine the adequacy of the school transportation systems of Montague County, Texas.

Interest in school transportation has emerged in response to concern over the reduced levels of physical activity among children and youth. Recent Canadian policies emphasize population health intervention to encourage active travel among this younger population; urban planners and public health professionals have also highlighted the importance of the neighbourhood built environment. However, this “child-youth friendly” turn in policy and planning practice, particularly in Canada, has arguably occurred in advance of conclusive and generalizable knowledge about the relationship between the built environment and children’s travel. Within this context, this thesis is the first quantitative research that examines school transportation mode choice behaviour in the largest Canadian city, the City of Toronto. At first, a Behavioural Model of School Transportation was outlined. This exercise was followed by three empirical studies that explored school travel by children and youth, using travel data from Transportation Tomorrow Survey. The first of these three studies investigated the association between the built environment and the likelihood of walking or being driven, for journeys to and from school. The next study focused on a measurement issue; the potential influence of the modifiable areal unit problem on statistical modelling of the built environment - mode choice relationship was examined. Lastly, the potential influence of travel interactions among household members, the built environment, and unobservable spatial dependency (i.e., spatial auto-correlation), on school travel outcome of children and youth, were examined. The results indicated that caregiver availability may influence travel mode choice. The built environment near both home and school locations was associated with the likelihood of walking. In addition, the correlates of mode choice were different between children and youth, which perhaps, reflects a child’s cognitive development with age as an independent traveller. These findings suggest the need for neighbourhood-wide improvement in the built environment, and age-specific population health interventions at schools and in the communities.

In spite of increasing interests in the relationship between neighborhood environments and children's walking-to-school behaviors, few studies have examined the dynamic nature of school-community relationships from physical and social perspectives. Questions such as how centrally the school is located within the larger community, and how connected or accessible the school is to the surrounding communities, will have significant implications for children?s walking to school and physical activity behaviors and also for the community's social capital. The primary aims of this study are: (a) to assess the association between school-community relations and social capital among parents of school children; (b) to assess the relationship between school-community relations and walking-to-school behaviors among school children; and (c) to examine the mediating effects of social capital on the relationship of (b). This cross-sectional study focuses on children and parents from 19 elementary schools in the Austin Independent School District (AISD) in Austin, Texas, utilizing the parental Safe Routes to School (SRTS) survey and conducting a follow-up Parental Social Capital survey to gather additional in-depth data on social capital. Also objective measurements are performed to assess school-community relations and physical environments using the spatial centrality index and Geographical Information System (GIS) network analysis at/around schools and surrounding communities. Data analyses are conducted based at the school/community-level and the individual-level (large full data and small sub-group data) separately by using ANOVAs, bivariate statistical analysis and multivariate statistical models. Overall findings of this study show that: (a) neighborhood schools have more students walking to school and a higher centrality of the school than non-neighborhood schools; (b) differences in social capital between neighborhood schools and non-neighborhood schools are not significant or are only marginally significantly; (c) two social capital variables, "volunteerism" and "social cohesion" are correlated with children's walking-to-school behaviors but no significant mediating effect is found for social capital in the association between school-community relations and children's walking-to-school behaviors; and (d) "volunteerism" is shown to be positively correlated with "perceived centrality" but negatively associated with all objective centrality measures. The other social capital variable of "social cohesion" has a positive correlation with one of the objective centrality measures, "closeness centrality." Findings of this study may contribute to research exploring the dynamics of school-community relations with socio-spatial perspectives, and also bring attention to the policy makers for school siting in the large community context and evidence-based knowledge promoting healthy community design.

Introduction: Physical activity (PA) in Canadian adolescents is low, and active travel to school is an important source of PA. Neighbourhood walkability is linked to youth PA, and may also be related to school travel behaviour. Therefore, the aim of this thesis was to explore the association between adolescents’ school travel-PA, school travel mode, and walkability in urban and suburban neighbourhoods. Methods: Adolescents (n=234; grade 8-10) were sampled from schools in a high walkability urban (n=52) and a low walkability suburban neighbourhood (n=182). PA was measured by accelerometry (ActiGraph; ≥4d 600 min·d-1), and converted from activity counts to minutes of moderate-to-vigorous PA (MVPA). Travel-PA was derived from minutes of MVPA accrued during the hour before and after school. Travel mode was self-reported (i.e., walk, bike, transit, school bus, car). Analyses were stratified by sex and travel mode (Stata v.10). Results: Valid travel data were provided by 224 participants (49.6% girls). Prevalence of travel modes differed significantly between urban and suburban boys (χ2=25.4, p<0.001) and girls (χ2=21.0, p<0.001). Valid PA and travel data were available for an analytical sample (n=91, 58.2% girls). Differences in collapsed modes (active vs. passive) were not significant between cohorts for boys (χ2=1.5, p=0.22) or girls (χ2=0.3, p=0.61). Minutes of travel-PA were significantly higher in urban than suburban boys for both active (29.4±9.2 vs. 11.0±9.2, p<0.001) and passive travel (22.6±2.7 vs. 8.8±7.4, p<0.001). There were no significant differences in girls. Conclusion: These results suggest that neighbourhood walkability may be associated with school travel-PA in boys, regardless of travel mode. More research is needed to understand this association in girls. The research also showed travel modes were different between neighbourhood cohorts, but when modes were collapsed into larger categories (passive and active) they were not. Future research should analyse school travel-PA by detailed travel modes whenever possible. / Graduate / 0573 / afrazer@uvic.ca

Interest in school transportation has emerged in response to concern over the reduced levels of physical activity among children and youth. Recent Canadian policies emphasize population health intervention to encourage active travel among this younger population; urban planners and public health professionals have also highlighted the importance of the neighbourhood built environment. However, this “child-youth friendly” turn in policy and planning practice, particularly in Canada, has arguably occurred in advance of conclusive and generalizable knowledge about the relationship between the built environment and children’s travel. Within this context, this thesis is the first quantitative research that examines school transportation mode choice behaviour in the largest Canadian city, the City of Toronto. At first, a Behavioural Model of School Transportation was outlined. This exercise was followed by three empirical studies that explored school travel by children and youth, using travel data from Transportation Tomorrow Survey. The first of these three studies investigated the association between the built environment and the likelihood of walking or being driven, for journeys to and from school. The next study focused on a measurement issue; the potential influence of the modifiable areal unit problem on statistical modelling of the built environment - mode choice relationship was examined. Lastly, the potential influence of travel interactions among household members, the built environment, and unobservable spatial dependency (i.e., spatial auto-correlation), on school travel outcome of children and youth, were examined. The results indicated that caregiver availability may influence travel mode choice. The built environment near both home and school locations was associated with the likelihood of walking. In addition, the correlates of mode choice were different between children and youth, which perhaps, reflects a child’s cognitive development with age as an independent traveller. These findings suggest the need for neighbourhood-wide improvement in the built environment, and age-specific population health interventions at schools and in the communities.

Students' behavior on buses continues to be an issue that requires administrators to spend significant time investigating and applying consequences for the behavior (Neatrour, 1994; Pattington, 1945; Putnam, Handler, Ramirez-Plat, and Luiselli, 2003). The purpose of this study was to identify policies and practices that may improve student bus behavior. Two research questions were addressed: (a) What policies could school districts implement to facilitate the improvement of student bus behavior? (b) What practices could school districts implement to facilitate the improvement of student bus behavior? A three-round Delphi technique was used to conduct the research. The goal was to obtain consensus among experts on the policies and practices that school districts could implement to improve student bus behavior. A panel of 22 experts on student bus behavior participated in one or more rounds of the study. Panelists were selected based on their involvement with and knowledge of student bus behavior and their geographic location, using the five-region structure of the National Association for Pupil Transportation. This process resulted in a broad representation of experts on student bus behavior throughout the United States. The panel of experts included superintendents, directors of transportation, principals or assistant principals, bus drivers, presidents of out-sourced school transportation companies, authors, researchers, and members of the National Association for Pupil Transportation Board of Directors. Panelists recommended 19 policies and 284 practices for school districts to implement to improve student bus behavior. Based on the consensus of the panelists, student bus behavior could be improved if polices were enacted in eight areas: bus driver responsibility, stakeholder training, bus driver evaluation through observation, student consequences for assaulting a bus driver, bus ridership, bus surveillance technology, bus routes for special education students, and a district-wide universal transportation system with supporting programs. Panelists indicated that student bus behavior could be improved if practices were implemented in nine areas: stakeholder communication, bus driver knowledge, stakeholder training content, stakeholder training processes, stakeholder daily practices, the enforcement of policies and procedures, positive behavior support systems, data analysis, and a district advisory committee. / Ed. D.

An analysis of crash data shows that the number of fatal school bus related crashes has remained nearly constant over the past ten years, despite an increase in available safety-improving technology. One of the main concerns related to school bus safety is the issue of illegally passing a stopped school bus. To improve safety around stopped school buses, this dissertation presents a Concept of Operations for a connected vehicle application to improve safety around stopped school buses using Dedicated Short Range Communication. The focus of this application is to increase awareness of stopped school buses or bus stops that are obscured from the driver's view. An on-road naturalistic driving experiment evaluated driver response to an in-vehicle message to warn drivers that they were approaching a school bus that was stopped around a curve. The dissertation concludes by using microsimulation to evaluate the impact of implementing specialized speed control algorithms to reduce vehicle speeds near bus stops along high speed roads. The simulation evaluated the effect of the reduce speed zone on travel time and emissions when the system was considered as a pre-timed speed limit and also when the system was modeled as a connected vehicle system. / Ph. D.

The effect of selected driver and instructional variables on attitude change of school bus drivers was examined. A total of 113 male and 69 female in-service Texas school bus drivers participated. The course of instruction, totaling 20 classroom hours, consisted of 11 units related to driving efficiency. Driver attitude was measured by a multiple-choice check list, administered prior to and following the course of instruction. A significant positive change occurred in those variables related to driver age, educational attainment, and number of classroom participants. Those variables involving course participation status and sex difference resulted in no significant positive attitude change. These findings may prove helpful in designing training programs for school bus drivers.

Made available in DSpace on 2016-06-02T20:00:38Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 1 3798.pdf: 2095976 bytes, checksum: b15115384f7a1b3abfa6d6b28d9ed7a0 (MD5) Previous issue date: 2011-10-22 / Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos / In the late years, the number of children who go to school by active modes of transport has decreased significantly. This fact causes several problems both in the area of urban transport (creating traffic congestions and accidents in the school neighborhood during the periods of starting and finishing classes) and in the area of public health (increasing the indices of child obesity). In this context, the objective of this research is to identify which factors influence the mode choice of elementary school children to access the schools. The focus of the research are the public elementary schools, because the geographic area that these schools traditionally serve (neighborhoods) permits that the trips be made by non motorized modes, for a great fraction of the students. The case study was developed in the city of São Carlos, SP with students that attend Municipal Elementary Schools. The survey was carried with the students´ parents by means of questionnaires about the children s personal characteristics, as well as their perception of the route from the residence to the school. The data showed that several factors influence the mode choice for the children trip to school, like the perception of safety and security in the neighborhood, the automobile availability in the residence, the parents habits and culture in relation to the motorized modes of transport and the distance for the residence to the school (the factor that proved to have the strongest impact in the parents decision). The discrete choice models were chosen for the estimation of the modal choice because they are largely used in transportation studies. Among the models that were tested, the multinomial logit was the most adequate. The calibrated model showed satisfactory and significant results, demonstrating that the chosen approach is adequate to the analysis of the mode choice for the trips of children to school. / Nos últimos anos, o número de crianças que vão por modos ativos para a escola vem diminuindo significativamente. Este fato causa problemas tanto na área de transporte urbano, (gerando congestionamentos e acidentes na região das escolas nos horários de entrada e saída) como na área de saúde pública (aumentando os índices de obesidade infantil). Neste contexto, esta pesquisa visa identificar quais os fatores que influenciam na opção de modo de transporte para acesso das crianças à escola. O foco da pesquisa são as escolas de ensino público fundamental porque a área geográfica que estas escolas tradicionalmente servem (bairros) permite que as viagens se dêem por modos não motorizados, para uma grande parcela dos alunos. O estudo de caso foi realizado na cidade de São Carlos, SP, junto aos alunos de Escolas Municipais de Ensino Básico (EMEBs). A coleta de dados foi realizada junto aos pais dos alunos através de questionários sobre características pessoais das crianças, bem como a percepção do ambiente a ser percorrido no caminho casa-escola. Os dados demonstraram que vários fatores influenciam a escolha do modo de transporte das crianças para a escola, como a percepção de seguridade e segurança do bairro, a disponibilidade de automóveis nas residências, os hábitos e a cultura dos pais em relação ao uso de modos motorizados e a distância casa-escola (fator de maior impacto na decisão dos pais). Para estimativa do modelo de opção modal, optou-se pelo uso de modelos de escolha discreta, devido ao fato de este modelo ser largamente utilizado para estudos na área de transportes. Dentre os modelos testados, o modelo logit multinomial se mostrou mais adequado. O modelo calibrado apresentou resultados satisfatórios e significativos, demonstrando que a abordagem utilizada é adequada à análise da escolha modal para viagens de crianças para a escola.