Muscat: With the new academic year to start on Tuesday, the Royal Oman Police (ROP) has started awareness campaigns to ensure the safe transportation of school students , in addition to educating vehicle drivers and urging them to adhere to traffic regulations for the safety of school students.
ROP has been making efforts to reduce traffic congestion by securing bus lanes, increasing police presence, removing traffic jams, if any, and other measures that ensure safe access for students to and from schools.
The Ministry of Transport, Communications, and Information Technology (MTCIT) has stressed the need for bus drivers to be fully prepared and adhere to security and safety requirements during the transportation of students in the new academic year 2023-2024, and to register buses on the ministry's transportation platform.
They should follow the approved technical specifications. for school transportation.
The ministry warned that it will carry out periodical inspection campaigns on school transport buses and continuously throughout the academic year to ensure the safety of students by making sure they commute in a safe manner on buses equipped with advanced safety features.
ROP has issued guidelines for bus drivers to ensure the safe transportation of students.
The instructions are significant because speeding, negligence, bad behavior and not keeping a safe distance are among the main causes of traffic accidents in the country, according to the latest statistics.
The police have taken many measures in coordination with the Ministry of Education and in line with the Traffic Law and its executive regulations. The roads will witness traffic congestion, especially at peak times, and therefore traffic patrols will work to facilitate traffic and deal with all that obstructs traffic, especially in places with more congestion than others. Traffic patrols will facilitate the movement of buses, give them priority in traffic, and monitor the extent to which the bus driver adheres to traffic rules and regulations, and the number of allowed on a bus.
He said that all drivers of public and private school buses must be careful when approaching student gathering places and not move until after making sure that all students have crossed the streets. They should stop buses in their designated places, whether in front of schools or after work is completed.
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