China Goes Schoolbus Crazy

China has 1.4 billion people, and despite rumors to the contrary, it has some 200 million children that have to be ferried to school every day. Since there were no rules for this sort of transport, local schools used whatever vehicles they could find to bring children to class without paying any attention to safety. Because of that, things went wrong now and then, especially in the messy countryside.

Since it was usually about small numbers, one or two children dead, nobody really cared. Recently, three big school bus accidents happened where altogether more than 30 children died. China suddenly woke up and the central government belatedly announced strict rules for school-buses. Sure enough, car companies jumped at the opportunity to earn some good old government money. They came up with brand-new ‘super-safe buses-’In this article, we take a look at three of them.

This fine looking vehicle is simply called ‘Chengdu School bus.’ It was unveiled only a few weeks ago. Manufacturer is the ‘Chengdu Automobile Factory’ in the great city of Chengdu in Sichuan province. In basic configuration it is six meters long, it seats 24 students and costs 150.000 yuan ($23,800.) There will be longer versions from 7 and 9 meters as well.

According to the factory, ‘mass production is about to begin’. The Chengdu School bus is equipped with all kinds of safety systems such as emergency doors and alarm buttons next to each seat (that will be a lot of fun, I guess that function will be disabled soon, or a master switch will be installed.)

Our second vehicle is the Maxus V80 School bus. Maxus is a brand from SAIC (a.k.a. Shanghai Auto) that bought Maxus from bankrupt British LDV, and set up production in China. The normal Maxus V80 was listed in September, the V80 school bus version was unveiled in early December. It is a much more van-like design and seats 16 students. There won’t be any extended versions.

The price for a basic V80 school bus starts at some 160.000 yuan ($25,400.) Just like the Chengdu, the V80 has all kinds of safety systems including a bunch of cameras and a system that opens all doors (two at the front + rear doors) at the push of one button. Note that colors and graphics on the outside of all buses is the same, this indeed is a first sign of the new government-regulations. The Maxus V80 School bus will be listed early next year.

Our third vehicle is the big FAW School bus. It is a copy of the iconic American school bus, nobody tries to hide that and nobody cares, Chinese media calls it ‘our domestic American schoolbus’. It debuted as a just-for-fun concept car on the 2010 Beijing Auto Show. After the above mentioned misery, FAW quickly decided to produce their domestic American school bus and brought it to the market in November.

The FAW School bus is by far the biggest school bus available today; it can carry 37 students. It is already is use in some 25 cities in China. The FAW comes with safety features such as an escape hatch in the roof and a sprinkler system (that one is going to be a lot of fun as well…) .

Let’s hope these three beautiful buses will save some lives. Sadly, experience tells that these well-meant government initiatives usually die within a year, mostly due to all sorts of obstruction at the local level. But at least, there is a start…

Dutchman Tycho de Feyter runs Carnewschina.com, a blog about cars in China, from Beijing, China. He also collects die-cast models of Chinese cars.