School buses are back on the road on Tuesday and drivers will notice something different.
All school buses across Ontario are now outfitted with an eight-lamp amber light system.
Pierre Ranger, chair of the Let’s Remember Adam campaign, says it’s a warning system ahead of the bus stopping.
“When the amber lights come on, drivers in the area that are near that bus can understand what that bus is about to do, how it’s about to stop. When those amber lights come on it’s time for you as a driver to slow down,” he says. “Once the red lights come on, that’s it, you can’t pass that bus, there’s no going by it at all and it’s illegal to pass it at that point.”
Ranger says they also continue to advocate for stop-arm cameras on buses across the the province, too.
“Mattawa is still the only municipality, that I’m aware, in Ontario that has all of their school buses outfitted with stop-arm camera systems,” he says. “We are working to try and get North Bay to be the next big one, and we’re hoping we can make that happen.”
Ranger is encouraging everyone to keep the first day of school on Tuesday incident-free by watching for school buses and for children walking to and from school.
His brother Adam was killed in February 2000 when a truck failed to stop for his school bus in Mattawa.
