I.          Introduction

            This document proposes to upgrade the school bus occupant protection requirements of the Federal motor vehicle safety standards, primarily by amendments to Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standard No. (FMVSS) No. 222, “School bus passenger seating and crash protection” (49 CFR 571.222), and by amendments to FMVSS Nos. 207, 208, and 210.  It also provides guidance to state and local jurisdictions on the subject of installing seat belts on large school buses (school buses with a GVWR greater than 4,536 kilograms (kg) (10,000 pounds (lb)) and asks for comments on the agency’s consideration of “best practices” concerning the belts on the large buses.1 

            This NPRM’s most significant proposed changes to FMVSS No. 222 involve:

  • Increasing the minimum seat back height requirement from 20 inches from the seat’s seating reference point (SgRP) to 24 inches for all school buses;
  • Requiring small school buses to have a lap/shoulder belt at each passenger seating position (the buses are currently required to have lap belts);
  • Incorporating test procedures into the standard to test lap/shoulder belts in small school buses and voluntarily-installed lap/shoulder belts in large school buses to ensure both the strength of the anchorages and the compatibility of the seat with compartmentalization; and,
  • Requiring all school buses with seat bottom cushions that are designed to flip-up, typically for easy cleaning, to have a self-latching mechanism.

The proposed guidance to state and local jurisdictions on best practices of installing seat belts on large school buses acknowledges that, in terms of the optimum passenger crash protection that can be afforded an individual passenger on a large school bus, a lap/shoulder belt system, together with compartmentalization, would afford that optimum protection. Thus, we encourage providers to consider lap/shoulder belts on large school buses. However, installing current lap/shoulder belts on large school buses would reduce the passenger carrying capacity of large buses. If children were diverted to other means of transport to school, such as transport by smaller, private vehicles, walking, or biking, the belts on the buses could result in an overall disbenefit to pupil transportation safety due to the children displaced from the large school buses having to find less safe modes of transportation to get to or from school or related events. Thus, we are not proposing to require lap/shoulder belts on large school buses, and we recommend providers to ascertain whether installing lap/shoulder belts would reduce the number of children that are transported to school on large school buses.

“School bus” is defined in 49 CFR §571.3 as a bus that is sold, or introduced in interstate commerce, for purposes that include carrying students to and from school or related events, but does not include a bus designed and sold for operation as a common carrier in urban transportation.  A “bus” is a motor vehicle, except a trailer, designed for carrying more than 10 persons.  In this NPRM, when we refer to “large” school buses, we refer to those school buses with GVWRs of more than 4,536 kg (10,000 lb).  These large school buses may transport as many as 90 students.  “Small” school buses are school buses with a GVWR of 4,536 kg (10,000 lb) or less.  Generally, these small school buses seat 15 persons or fewer, or have one or two wheelchair seating positions. 

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