Pace and school.buses

[Busjack]

Moved it here, since it got too far from Academy, although I helped push that.

I've saw an school bus conversion on one of Glendale Heights Routes operated on 653 on Glen Ellyn Road back in 2006 at Downtown Glen Ellyn.

I used to live in Glendale Heights, right along the route and caught those school buses to the train station. Absolutely hated it! Pace sign on the top, old 653 sign on the bottom of the window. There was simply no reason for them, I just didn't understand why they didn't put reg. Pace buses on those routes. The ride was so bumpy and in the summer time, forget the AC. Until the recent 657 route was cut, those were still being operated by school buses. Now only the 711/715 run close to those areas.

When I was referring to a school bus conversion, I meant like that pictured, in that it at least was painted to look like a Pace bus, as opposed to what was in Glen Ellyn, and until 3 years ago in Naperville, which were actually school buses.

Now that the routes using school buses are dead, that is a reversal from what was the situation, say, from when Chicago Transit and Railfan started tracing Pace routes, to about 1997, when the 2500s arrived. During that period, the contractors had to provide their own equipment, and most of the operations were run by school bus companies. There were also more feeders at that time, such as 622 in Northbrook and 740 in Oak Forest, and a story in the Tribune at that time about how the school bus company kept one bus in better shape, so it would start at 5:00 a.m., and also had a farebox.

That also seemed to make sense, in that the school bus company could run the Pace route, do its school business, and then, after 5:00 p.m., do a Pace route.

When the 2500s (El Dorado Transmarks) arrived in 1997, Pace said that one of the purposes was to put its brand out on the feeders. However, there never were enough to do that, and the Naperville and Glen Ellyn-Wheaton contracts were mostly school buses, although Wheaton got a few ElDorados. When the 2500s started falling apart, Orion Is started appearing on the Lisle and Wheaton contracts.

As I probably have said ad nauseum, the Pace budget never explained the source of funding for Naperville's 2600s, but it was posted on the Naperville Metra Station that the city council had to approve a larger subsidy for Pace before it would put them in service.

As far as 653-654-657, Pace tried to kill them in 2007, and the rfp for the now Wheaton-Lombard contract only covered 674, 709, 711, and 715. With the 2008 RTA bill, they left the couple of school buses, but we all know that the death of the routes could not be staved off forever.

[Railwaymodeler]

A friend of mine who has been driving buses since it was Waukegan-North Chicago Transit up here, told me of the time a long time ago, when Pace North used actual school buses to do their routes following an equipment shortage. They had pieces of cardboard with the company name, and route number on it.

I think he said that was when it was Pace (Post-1984), but I could be wrong. I keep forgetting to ask him about it.

I dont remember why they had the equipment shortage, but I am thinking that it had something to do with the Flxible-Grumman 870s...

[Busjack]

The Grumman shortage was about 1980, which would predate Pace. There were television news reports at the time that South Suburban Safeway (predecessor of Pace South) had to round up school buses.

My impression was that Waukegan and North Chicago had just received the RTA pumpkin 4523s.* However, sources such as Chicago Transit and Railfan, and this picture site, indicate that Pace acquired 20 Carpenter buses from CTA (that CTA had apparently used in paratransit service) and some of those went to North. They wouldn't have been much better than school buses. This post contains links of other puny stuff run during the early RTA years, from the same album.

______________

*One of them appeared in a Mary Tyler Moore movie, maybe Ordinary People.

[Guest]

The Grumman shortage was about 1980, which would predate Pace. There were television news reports at the time that South Suburban Safeway (predecessor of Pace South) had to round up school buses.

My impression was that Waukegan and North Chicago had just received the RTA pumpkin 4523s.* However, sources such as Chicago Transit and Railfan, and this picture site, indicate that Pace acquired 20 Carpenter buses from CTA (that CTA had apparently used in paratransit service) and some of those went to North. They wouldn't have been much better than school buses. This post contains links of other puny stuff run during the early RTA years, from the same album.

______________

*One of them appeared in a Mary Tyler Moore movie, maybe Ordinary People.

Theres actually a news video on YouTube of those buses and the equipment shortage across the nation following the Grumman fiasco .

[artthouwill]

The buses in the various pictures, though owned by school bus companies, really don't seem to be school buses. Bluebird, a company that makes school buses, also makes "coach buses" using the same frames and chassis, but adds coach like features like nice seats, under carriage luggage space, etc, and these buses can double for school buses in emergencies. Royal American used these type buses on the downtown Northwestern train shuttles as opposed to using its Prevost coach fleet (which they did use on the downtown to Evanston campus shuttle). Free Enterprise, which bought out Royal, uses transit buses on both.

These bluebirds can also be used for charters, not as expensive as a motorcoach, but nicer than a school bus.

[Railwaymodeler]

The Grumman shortage was about 1980, which would predate Pace. There were television news reports at the time that South Suburban Safeway (predecessor of Pace South) had to round up school buses.

My impression was that Waukegan and North Chicago had just received the RTA pumpkin 4523s.* However, sources such as Chicago Transit and Railfan, and this picture site, indicate that Pace acquired 20 Carpenter buses from CTA (that CTA had apparently used in paratransit service) and some of those went to North. They wouldn't have been much better than school buses. This post contains links of other puny stuff run during the early RTA years, from the same album.

______________

*One of them appeared in a Mary Tyler Moore movie, maybe Ordinary People.

I am pretty sure it was 'Ordinary People'. One of the North drivers I know remembers it.

I think, now that you mention it, he did say they were Carpenter buses too.

My memory is not the best.