Special Education Needs

Edmonton Public Schools provides Special Education Needs transportation to students with physical, mental or other disabilities who require a high level of care and attention, are unable to walk to school or use Regular or Alternative Program routes and who are attending their designated school.

Special Education Needs Eligibility

• Special Education Needs busing is provided by Edmonton Public Schools where the Special Education Needs programming required by the student is not available at the neighbourhood school.
• Special Education Needs busing is also provided at most sites where Special Education Needs programs are available.
• Limited Special Education Needs busing is offered in non-urban areas of Edmonton.
• A child's needs are determined by district assessments that result in the child receiving a coding that indicates the severity of the disability, the appropriate programming and other information. The most severe cases are provided with mandatory transportation as required by provincial law. The less severe cases will be transported in accordance with available resources and the ability of the child to walk to school, or use ETS or regular yellow busing. When it is recommended by the district that the child attend a district Special Education Needs site, transportation may be provided depending on the level of the child's needs.

Special Education Needs Route Information

• Special Education Needs busing is approached under a different set of criteria than the busing for Kindergarten Noon students, Alternative Program students, and Regular Program students.
  • Routing and communication of schedules is the responsibility of the driver and the bus company.
  • Seat restraints may be necessary. A variety of different options are available to ensure the child's safety.
  • A variety of mobility aids can be accommodated, and will be secured during loading, traveling and unloading.
• Ride times:
  • In-Zone ride times, where the school and home fall within the same zone of the city, may be up to 60 minutes one-way. Our goal is to provide demand-based service while minimizing the ride times.
  • Adjacent-Zone ride times, where the school and home are not located in the same zone of the city, but are in adjacent zones, may be up to 80 minutes one-way. Our goal is to provide demand-based service and minimize ride-times while challenged by the greater distances involved.
  • Out-of-Zone ride times, where the school and home are more than one full zone apart, have no set limits. Our goal is to provide demand-based service and maintain the best possible ride times while challenged by the long distances involved.
• Bus stop locations:
  • Door-to-door service is provided to the nearest curb to the destination address, with access limitations only (i.e., any obstacles that would impede the safe operation of the bus).
• Walk distances:
  • Efforts are made to provide pick-up or drop-off on a door-to-door basis or at the nearest curb.
• Roadways:
  • Minimum roadway width is 7 meters.
  • Depending on the size of yellow bus being used for a particular Special Education Needs route, access into apartment and condominium developments may be limited to the nearest curb as opposed to door-to-door service.
  • Roadways must provide adequate turnaround opportunity.
• Network type:
  • On-Demand design.
  • Generally, Special Education Needs yellow busing is designed to provide door-to-door service to eligible Special Education Needs students.
• Bus arrival times:
  • Due to the door-to-door nature of this routing, the necessity for an escort to meet the children, possible mobility aids (i.e., wheelchairs), seat restraints, and the frequency of route changes, schedule adherence challenges are high. Schedule adherence is moderate and should be within 10 minutes of scheduled time.
• Bus schedule change requests:
  • Changes are considered (but not guaranteed) on a weekly basis.
  • Deadline is 3:00 pm daily for possible changes within 7 days of submitting.
  • Due to the routing complexities and the effects of changes on other riders, a best efforts basis is used for making changes.

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