Michael Ring
Ceist:247 Mr. Ring asked the Minister for Education if she will ensure that a school bus (details supplied) in County Mayo will travel a further mile to collect eight young children. [24462/96]
Written Answers. - School Transport.
Primary school transport routes are planned so that no eligible child will have more than 1.5 miles to travel to a pick-up point. Pupils living off the main route of a service are generally expected to make their own way, or to be brought to convenient pick-up points along the main route.
The pupils to whom the Deputy refers live 1.1 miles from the route of service and are within my Department's guidelines.
In addition, the extension requested would adversely affect the level of service for a substantial number of pupils and the route proposed is unsuitable for the large vehicles on this service.
Accordingly, it is not open to my Department to incur extra cost in providing the extension as requested. The present arrangement is the most that can be offered.