Subscribe to RSSBus Behaviour Worries Hamilton
Bad behaviour by school kids on Hamilton buses is worrying the local regional council.
Bus use has boomed in Hamilton over the past five years with annual patronage approaching the five million passenger trips mark, and many of the users are school children.
Environment Waikato says there has been a range of problems on some buses, involving a “small but distinctive group” of 50-100 young people from various schools.
These problems include graffiti, spitting, intimidation and fare evasion.
Practical measures already taken to prevent such problems include installing closed circuit TV cameras and putting security guards on some routes. Persistent troublemakers can also be barred from using buses.
However, a new proposal that has emerged is getting the ideas of young people to encourage good behavior through the creation of a special youth council.
The suggestion was raised at a recent discussion group hosted by Environment Waikato, which included representatives from Hamilton city schools, school boards, the police and the Hamilton City Safe group.
“Rather than just focus on bad behaviour, the group discussed a range of options to encourage a stronger culture of good behaviour,” said EW’s land transport operations manager Bevan Dale.
“The proposal to create a youth council representing Hamilton’s secondary and intermediate schools could be one way of developing positive solutions from the student perspective.”
Mr Dale said EW would be developing the idea further with various stakeholders to see how such a council could best be run.
“This would be an opportunity for our youth to play a leadership role in improving the environment of the passenger transport network, making it pleasant travel experience for everyone all of the time,” said Mr Dale.
2 Comments
Am I being too negative, or is this just another case where lack of “enforcement” is patched over by goody-goody “education”?
If one can identify the particular people doing this (as one would expect on school runs), then why not just simply ban them for a couple of months each time they do something like this? Is that not possible, legally?
karl, at my old primary school, that was the type of system we used for bad behavior, 3 warnings and you are off the bus for a fortnight, worked really well in my opinion, we used to have 1 person per day kicked off, and a month later it was once every three weeks. but i dunno about the teenage students though because they are the worlds nuttiest people (even though i’m one!)