Family of Rachel Turner calls for school bus safety recommendations to be implemented
By ALAN SHACKLETON
The family of Rachel Turner, the young Beach woman who died after being hit by the driver of a school bus last month, made a plea for school bus safety recommendations to be enforced during a news conference yesterday.
Turner, 22, was struck by a small school bus making a left turn from Kingston Road to head north on Kingswood Road on Oct. 9. Turner was legally crossing Kingswood within the pedestrian area when she was struck by a mirror on the bus. She died in hospital of her injuries on Oct. 13.
At a news conference in front of their Beach home on the morning of Wednesday, Nov. 20, Turner’s boyfriend Matthew Davis, her father Leon and her mother Susan spoke about the need to improve school bus safety measures. They were accompanied at the news conference by lawyer Michael Smitiuch of the firm Smitiuch Injury Lawyers, who is representing the Turner family.
In the last five months, between June and November, three pedestrians including Turner have died as a result of being struck by a school bus.
“The frequency of these trips, along with increased traffic congestion in urban areas, inadequate training of drivers and the failure to implement safety measures on buses is a recipe for death and serious injury,” said Smitiuch.
“The combination of insufficient technological upgrades and the lack of rigorous driver training means that, each year, 792 million trips carry a real possibility of risk. The risks of injuries and deaths involving school buses increases without these recommended improvements and we’re seeing such an increase with the three most recent fatalities in the GTA,” he added.
On June 19, a six-year-old boy died after being struck by the driver of school bus in Vaughan. And less than a month after Turner’s death, an 84-year-old woman died after being struck by a school bus in Richmond Hill on Nov. 5.
Speaking at the news conference, Leon Turner said it was important that Rachel not be just a “statistic” of pedestrians killed by school buses.
“Nobody should have to go through what we’re going through,” he said.
“Rachel had a great and bright future. She was very intelligent and creative, and now we’re never going to see her full potential reached. We just want to see some changes so we’re not doing press conferences like this anymore,” said Leon of the need for improvements to school bus safety.
Smitiuch said that in 2019 a Federal Task Force on School Bus Safety made a number of recommendations to increase the safety of the vehicles. On the issue of making school buses safer for pedestrians, the task force recommended the installation of exterior 360-degree camera systems and automatic emergency braking systems (AEB) operated by sensors. So far, the exterior camera and braking systems have not been made mandatory in school buses.
“The sad truth of this is that this death may have been preventable,” said Smitiuch.
“The other sad reality of this is that the governments involved with school buses have recognized the dangers involved with transporting kids back and forth,” he added.
“The actual regulations and laws concerning school buses is multi-layered, it starts at the federal government with Transport Canada and it goes down to the provincial government down to school boards and bus companies. The sad reality is as early as 2019, the federal government had commissioned a task force, a task force to look into school bus safety. Just like many task forces, nothing has been done, literally, since this task force report was completed. Some of the recommendations included having sensors on buses, just like we do on cars, having cameras on school buses so they can see what’s around them, and having automated braking systems as well.
“None of these measures that were recommended have been implemented. We have them in our cars and they’re required but not on school buses. We are calling on all levels of government today to immediately to enact and move on the recommendations of the task force.”
The Strengthening School Bus Safety in Canada Task Force began in 2019 and released its report in February of 2020. It can viewed at https://publications.gc.ca/collections/collection_2020/tc/T22-243-2020-eng.pdf
Along with technology based safety features, the report also called for mandatory training regulations for school bus drivers. Smitiuch said these have also not been implanted nationally, and each province has different regulations regarding what qualifications are needed to drive a school bus.
“The other area we are calling on the government to make changes are the requirements to become a school bus driver. If you dig into this, you’ll be shocked to know that the requirements are pretty lax. Especially when compared to other provinces. You only have to be 21 years old to drive a school bus. Part of the training at least can be done online, and I know Susan was shocked to hear that,” said Smitiuch.
“In Ontario, school bus drivers only need a Class B or E driver’s licence, which can be obtained at age 21. After receiving a temporary licence, drivers must complete the School Bus Driver Information Course (SBIC), a program that requires just a minimum of 6.5 hours of training.”
A news release distributed at the press conference said that school bus companies in Ontario do not mandate prior experience. The School Bus Driver Requirements for Ontario only require that drivers have held a valid licence for one year. In Alberta, one to two years of driving experience and completion of a 53.5 hour Mandatory Entry Level Training Program are required to be a school bus driver, said the news release.
“And the other shocking part, and we were all surprised to learn, is that you can have six demerit points and drive a school bus which is absolutely outrageous… These drivers are transporting our precious cargo, and to have six demerit points would shock anyone. So we’re calling on the government to also make changes to what’s required to be a school bus driver,” said Smitiuch.
“It’s our view that if these changes had been made five years ago, that possibly Rachel would still be here today and so would the two others who were also killed in the last five months,” he added.
Turner’s boyfriend Davis said at the news conference that he and the Turner family were hoping the media could “amplify” the message of how urgent it is to make safety measures on school buses mandatory.
“It’s important that Torontonians understand this could happen to anyone. Rachel was doing nothing wrong, she was walking through a crosswalk in broad daylight on her way to get the streetcar,” he said.
“It’s important that we listen to what some of these reports have said about school buses.”
Those speaking at Wednesday’s news conference wore green ribbons to show support for organ donations.
Turner’s death also resulted in the gift of a better life, or the chance for the continuation of life, for five people due to the donation of her organs. Her father Leon said that will be one of her legacies.
The Rachel Turner Legacy Fund has also been set up to support causes that were important to Rachel. For more information on the fund, please go to https://www.gofundme.com/f/Rachel-Turner-Legacy-Fund
“We hope to carry on some of the things that were important to her,” said Leon of the fund.
Making school bus safety a priority is one of the issues Turner would have taken a stand on, said her mother Susan.
“She would have been the first to say this doesn’t make sense and she’d be looking at ways…she’d be calling the media and say we have to make changes. She’d be writing the politicians…This is what she would have done,” said Susan.
“This is the hardest thing a parent has to do, to stand up and talk about their child. but this is for her. This is to honour what she would do if she were here because she doesn’t have a voice so we are now her voice, so hopefully something changes.”
