Illinois School Bus installs ridership tracking system on fleet

PALOS HEIGHTS, Ill. — Illinois School Bus has installed the ZPass ridership tracking system on its buses in preparation for the company’s service for Palos Heights District 128 for the upcoming school year. The system enables transportation managers to locate pupils on the buses in real time.

With ZPass, made by Zonar Systems, each student is issued an ID card that is attached to his or her backpack. The date, time and location that a student enters or exits a bus is logged and immediately transmitted to a secure database at each school.

In addition to helping ease the confusion that comes with the first few days of school, the ZPass system will help to ensure that none of the Palos Heights students is left on a school bus, officials said.

Moreover, Illinois School Bus officials said that the new tracking system will be particularly useful during the first few days of school as drivers adjust to new routes and children learn their bus stop locations.

“If a child isn’t home on time, parents can be assured that we have data showing that the bus is still in route, but might be running late,” said Tom O’Sullivan, vice president of Cook-Illinois Corp., Illinois School Bus’ parent company.