School bus using road that's closed due to safety issue - ok or not?

[BoobsOnTheMoon]

The main road through our village has been closed for several days due to "a risk of tree falls and landslide". The road is actually clear and nothing has fallen (yet) but it's a fairly frequent occurrence for large trees to fall completely blocking it, and not unknown for there to be minor landslides and rockfalls (2 years ago the same section was closed for 5 months after a landslide for reconstruction work). So highways have put up closure signs and signposted an official diversion that's about 8 miles long.

Lots of locals are using the closed road anyway, because there's nothing actually blocking it and they think the risk is overblown. I'm not using it even though it's a massive PITA because I'm quite anxious generally.

But yesterday and today, I saw the local secondary school bus (full of kids) drive past the road closed signs having obviously just come through the closed section of road. Would you think this was ok? Can't decide if IABU to consider contacting the school about it as I'd be furious if that was my DC...

I can sort of see people's point in continuing to use it if it's frequently closed despite no actual need for it to be, I mean closing it for day or months because something might happen at some point is madness. Surely if the risk is that great they should be removing the trees as they could fall at any point?

Also an 8 mile detour is bonkers when the road is actually clear to drive on. I wouldn't contact the school but instead I'd being contacting the highways agency and asking what the long term plan was. Constantly closing the road isn't a feasible long term solution.

But an 8 miles detour won’t work if there’s children along the original route that need collecting?

I think I'd contact the school and get them to make the parents aware this is happening - if some parents object they can take their kids the other route. I'd also contact highways because they can't just be closing roads due to the risk something might happen - they need to proactively stop it happening so cut down trees that are at risk and do some sort of retaining wall/feature to stop the landslides. Can't imagine where you live presumably at the bottom of a mountain?!

I should have explained better (or put a diagram) in the OP.

The road is closed for a 3 mile section between 2 junctions. There is only one house (no estates or villages) on that entire stretch and no school bus pick up points. The diversion would be a PITA but it wouldn't miss out any of the pick up points.

I assume the highways know of a specific risk at the moment because they have never closed this road before just due to a "risk" - it's closed pretty much every time there's a storm due to actual fallen trees or rocks, but never pre-emptively before.

Not quite a mountain! It's a road running along the bottom of a steeply banked and wooded river valley.

And highways latest post on social media said they were continuing work to make the road safe but I have no idea what is being done.

Does the diversion have low bridges or bridges a coach can't cross? Our local roundabouts are just before a low bridge that coaches and trucks can't get under.

No bridges. It's just looooong.

I think based on your updates I'd definitely contact the school and the council and say it's putting children at serious risk.

School buses tend to be quite heavily built, I'd imagine they're at a lot less risk of serious damage from something falling on them than a car would be.

The bus company should have already done a risk assessment and informed whomever they have their contract with (probably not school, more likely to be council) of their intention to use the road and this has been accepted.

Could be for a range of reasons and probably is - including perceived risk, ability of bus to use alternative routes from a vehicle manoeuvrability perspective, whether other people are picked up along that route, the amount of extra time it would take and therefore the need to redo the bus schedule for everyone using the bus (i.e. everyone has to arrive at their stop 20 minutes earlier - hard for families in particular), etc.

If you are concerned it is best to take it up with the bus company so they can put your mind at ease. Contacting the school just creates extra and unnecessary admin for them.

It's not a school bus as in an American style one 😅 it's just a small bus that does a school-only route.

No idea who the company is, it carries no branding. I know it's a school bus because it stops in our village (not at a public bus stop) and only picks up uniformed children, and the only other passengers are also uniformed children.

The actual public bus is using the diversion!

This is the best advice.

Contact the school transport team at the council, as they issue the contacts, not the school. Either they know, and this is risk assessed and agreed, or they don’t, in which case they should investigate and come to a decision with the bus company as to what is to do going forwards,

i don’t see an issue here, Highways are great at putting up closures without pragmatic solutions and have a very low risk tolerance. Congrats to the bus company for exhibiting come common sense, which I fear is becoming more and more lacking in society these days.

Tbh I would alert someone. There was a road clsure all weekend on a neighboring road and for some reason (Police are investigating) the school bus was allowed to use the road. Seems the signage was removed. But the issue is that it was due to a tree damaged in a storm. And short version, my sons bus was involved in a collision. 3 children had minor injuries and my son was fine (except he's autistic and had just buried his grandma a week earlier to the day so we are doing a lot of mindfulness with him to prevent any shutdown. I'm worried about him. So if you have concerns parents should know and get to make their own decisions about the safety of their children

I'd imagine the. Is insurance will be null and void too if they are driving on a closed road!

You need to raise this with whoever will listen. You don't want their deaths on your conscious.

It was pretty bad tbf, I would urge you to contact someone xx

That's shocking, I hope your son is okay.

The problem solved itself, not long after I posted, highways workers came and actually blocked the road with giant concrete blocks to prevent it being used. Apparently there was a dangerous landslip starting further up the hillside above the road and it may now be closed for weeks 😬