I don’t understand why school buses aren’t more popular here.
They have school buses in Japan?
If you’re talking about Taiwan, I’m not sure why. But it’s not really needed, there’s good public transportation in most places so kids just take the bus/MRT. When I was in the states if I missed a school bus there’s no way for me to get to school.
Any official answers from the MOE?
I’ve only ever seen school buses for international school kids, and vans for kindergarten kids. Never seen elementary kids in school buses.
I seen those vans that’s kinda yellow with diagonal red stripes and green trims. I’m assuming they’re from cram schools. For field trips they charter tour buses which are a lot nicer than school buses. The school buses I rode in Texas had no air conditioning.
They have shuttle buses for private schools. The reason why there are no school buses for public schools is that the government claims school districts are planned so that kids can walk to the schools in their district. Except now it is extremely dangerous for kids to walk on streets with no sidewalks during rush hour, which was was less of an issue in the 80s. Also, most areas with a lot of kids, the closest public schools often don’t have the capacity for all the eligible kids in the district, forcing them to go to schools outside of their own district.
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Yes, exactly. My above comment is that there are school busses, but they are private. For hire. Out of pocket type scenario. People don’t notice then because they aren’t bright yloe, but common none the less.
I can’t comment much on Japan on this scenario. But my birth country Canada and my home country Taiwan I would divide based on what @hansioux mentions. Taiwan has a school on every corner it seems. Canada it might take a while to get there. Although Taiwan high schools are far more spread apart. My wife took school busses her whole life. The worst trip being about an hour long (we aren’t old, that should be mentioned). Schools here hire private. Even government schools farm out contracts to bus companies. So the city bus look we may see daily can very easily be a school bus. The short bus, the van and etc.
A similar example might be food. Taiwnaese schools have lunches provided, but they are often done so by 3rd party businesses, not an in house cafeteria type setup.
One wouldn’t really notice them, because they are private. It’s not like the big old school yellow western style bus. It is a company vehicle with the company name spray painted on the side and would require checking each vehicles company name to see what they do for work and them just assuming that vehicle might be used as a bus.
Only some schools have their own in house busses. Like the kindergarten ones. Which I feel they probably only buy those because Mitsubishi sells them as is off the line and they seem to somehow skirt seatbelt laws for our more fragile citizens 
I do not think Taiwanese schools have cafeterias or even a kitchen at all. The outside business brings the food to the school I think. Not sure why they can’t have their own cafeteria.
Also in the US if you miss the school bus you’re getting an unexcused absence. My parents were out of town quite often so I had no choice. Truency is a criminal offense in Texas as well, meaning you can get arrested for skipping school. School was too far to walk to. I had at one point been able to walk to school in 5th grade, but only because I lived too close to the school and the school district wouldn’t provide buses if you lived that close.
I should say in the 80s kids face a different danger, as in they were in danger of being kidnapped.
I didn’t grow up in the US so I haven’t seen many bright yellow school buses.
In Hong Kong, everybody takes school bus so you always see a line of them driving up to the schools to drop off the kids. Nobody drops off their kids at school unless they live within walking distance.
It seems that in Taiwan, you see tons of parents in scooters and cars lining up in front of the schools blocking traffic, but school buses are nowhere to be found.
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Indeed, Taiwan is a country that is bigger than a city in a different country (Hong Kong) Not sure it really goes past that. Taiwan schools also have busses. In cities there are proper full size ones, even dotwm here in the south. for a long time actually. But many more private vehicles, for sure. I was a “school bus driver” for 7 years here in taiwan. I drove a ford Fiesta before upgrading to a Volkswagen van that cost more to maintain than the entire school lol. Pretty much every public school has lines of student transport waiting outside. Even in those small schools that have 7 grades and under 100 students. they just don’t look like “proper busses”. Some legal, some not (eg. Cram schools sometimes).
Only real point I wanted to make is you can actually hire door to door pick up/drop off in Taiwan. This is quite common here, as quite a lot ofbparents work and cant take their kids themself . It is easy and not expensive. For me, my worry is the intelligence of drivers, thus I drive my kid. Not on a scooter, that is counter productive. The lack of sidewalks here is also a no joke problem.
Japan trumps the absolute shit out of Taiwan on points of spacial awareness (driving skill, by proxy), sidewalks, basic respect for fellow humans. Japan fails elsewhere. But these ones, at least in this context, stand out to me.
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There’s tonnes and tonnes of school van buses and coaches whizzing around everywhere. Not sure how one couldn’t notice them. They just aren’t public buses.
There are actually some private schools that have fleets of ex American yellow school buses. Dongshan Private Junior and High School in Taipei had about 70 of those monstrous things.
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Can anyone explain why do Taiwanese have such poor spacial awareness? Did their parent beat it out of them by age of 10? This is one thing I hate about Taiwan, people don’t seem to be aware of their surrounding at all, whether it’s walking or driving. I mean there’s the whole politeness thing that my parent literally beat into me but almost no other Taiwanese seem to have it. Kids here are like super entitled and basically gets on the MRT like they own the place, while their parents don’t seem to do a whole lot to stop them (though honestly I’ve seen far worse working at Walmart).
They just don’t look like this
And remember those buses have NO air conditioning. I’d like to see anyone ride it (or drive in it) during the summer in Taiwan.
Dongshan school in Taipei had about 70 of them if I remember correctly.
Are they air conditioned?
Actually the site you pointed to, the buses look nothing like the American school bus. In the US school buses are essentially a rolling traffic light. When the red light comes on, you are NOT allowed to pass them, the driver will photograph you and you’ll get a ticket. I doubt they do that in Taiwan.
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It has been mentioned many times that the busses do not appear as they do in the USA. That does not, however, mean they don’t exist here 
usually only private schools, including cram and kindergarten have those yellow vans. If you walk into a Mitsubishi dealership, you can see their prepared pamphlets on pre-made school busses. Delica vans to be specific 
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Yeah now you say it they don’t. Maybe they are newer buses now from Japan and Taiwan
Or maybe my memory is shit. Anyway some private schools here operate large bus fleets.
Perhaps they imported those buses back in the day, but if my kids were riding in old buses without air conditioning after paying private school tuition, I’d be pissed too. They look the way they do because they have to, at least in the US.
Come to think of it, why isn’t school zone enforced at all in Taiwan? In the US when the school zone light comes on, you drive even 1 mile over 20 you get pulled over right away.
They have busses here…!
