More than 1,600 city school buses in Shanghai will be painted the same color - yellow or green -- and the city is cracking down on overloaded, unsafe, ill-maintained and recklessly driven buses.

The Shanghai Education Commission said yesterday regulations on the fleet, which includes leased shuttle buses and regular passenger buses, will be adopted by year's end. Subsidies will improve operations, since lack of funds means lack of maintenance and safety.

The city has 1,624 registered school buses carrying over 71,000 students to and from 411 elementary and middle schools every day.

In the meantime, residents are urged to report any school buses that are overloaded, obviously unsafe and driven in a dangerous manner.

School buses are required to display a big sign, saying "School bus" behind the windshield. But the buses, many from private companies, have no uniform color and "school bus" is not written on the side.

A single color would make the fleet identifiable and alert drivers to be careful.

City buses have not been in major accidents, but critics say crashes are waiting to happen.

Last August in Shenzhen, Guangdong Province, 19 students were killed and 19 other were injured in the crash of a speeding school bus, with an inexperienced driver.

Shanghai safety regulations will determine capacity by the actual number of seats - not the stated load capacity, which includes standing passengers. Students will not be allowed to stand.

"Despite previous crackdowns, hidden safety problems include overloading, lack of maintenance, safety flaws and unqualified drivers," said Yang Yongming, of the commission.

A citywide spot check last year showed 317 school buses failed annual police safety checks - 22 percent of those checked.

Many of the schools served by buses are for migrant children, or located in suburban areas.

(Shanghai Daily April 29, 2006)