CHICAGO (WBBM NEWSRADIO) -- Almost three months into the new school year, and the Chicago Public Schools system still has thousands of students who do not have a way to get to school.
The district is slowly chipping away at the number of students who are without transportation. An official said that two weeks ago, 3,800 children were without a way to get to school. Since then, rides have been found for about 500 of them.
Schools CEO Pedro Martinez said that with the nationwide bus driver shortage, there are some transportation lessons being learned this year; and he said, it might mean that going the yellow bus mode might not be the exclusive way to go.
"There’s going to be a lot of lessons to learn from, in terms of different modes of transportation, because I’m not sure, even for next year, if having yellow buses should be the exclusive way to transport children," Martinez said.
“Our old way of thinking might be too restrictive.”
Amid national bus driver shortage, CPS has teamed up with taxi firms and a company called RideAlong, which specializes in providing rides to children. Martinez said the district is working to get more drivers from the RideAlong company to transport children.
"Assuming that there are no issues or complications with vendor background checks of the drivers, we can anticipate routing up to 80 students starting next Tuesday," said Kim Jones, who heads CPS transportation services.
Additionally, CPS said the families of more than 700 children are being paid $500 a month to find their own way to get to school. Martinez said that may continue next year.
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