As i said in another comment, busses intentionally Doo not have Mansfield Bars so a vehicle rear ending the bus goes under instead of transferring all of the force of the impact into the bus.
The bus is tall for two main reasons. First, to avoid getting high-centered on bumps. Since the rear wheels are fairly far forward on the bus, and the tail sticks out behind them so far. There’s a lot of vertical travel whenever the bus goes over bumps, like a lever arm being moved up and down. Notice that on a semi trailer, the wheels are near the very back of the trailer. But on a bus, the rear wheels are only about 3/4 back. This means that the tail of a bus can land on top of a steep hill (lifting the rear wheels off the ground, and effectively immobilizing the entire bus) if the tail is too low.
“Just move the rear wheels back, so the tail won’t land on anything” I hear some people starting to reply. Except that would inevitably prevent the bus from making necessary turns. Busses need to be able to fit into residential areas to pick up and drop off kids. Residential areas tend to have narrower streets, more street parking, and tighter turns. Semi trailers don’t need to fit into those smaller side streets, and are okay with a wider turn radius. So semi trailers are able to keep the wheels way back at the end of the trailer. But since a bus needs to be able to fit into those tighter residential areas, they need to have the wheels set closer to the front of the bus, so they can make those tighter turns.
Lastly (and I’d argue, most importantly), lowering the bus or reducing the mass would increase the risk to the kids inside of the bus. By allowing the car to slide under the bus, a lot of the kinetic energy is distributed vertically, (picking up the tail of the bus and pushing the rear-ending vehicle down) instead of directing it into crumpling the back of the bus. Because the back of a bus has very little room for crumple zones. The back seats are essentially right up against the rear wall of the bus. If you lower the bus and expect it to crumple, you’re going to crush kids. And a pragmatic engineer could easily argue that the design shouldn’t intentionally shatter twenty kids’ femurs just to save one negligent driver’s life.
Modern school bus designs are basically the culmination of engineering for a very specific set of requirements: 1) keep kids safe, 2) be able to fit into residential areas so the bus can pick up/drop off near the kids houses (which helps keep them safe), and 3) avoid getting high-centered on anything. And “keeping people who rear-end it safe” wasn’t on the list of requirements. A Mansfield bar at the back of the bus would defeat at least one of those requirements, by making high-centering much more common. The needs of the many (the kids) outweigh the needs of the few (the rear-ender) in this case.
This is an explanation why the dumbass bus is shaped like it is, not whether it’s safer thaan the conventional bus designs, that the rest of the world uses.
Saying this can’t get over bumps or make tight turns is just being stuck up your own ass.
The US has busses like that too. They drive bus routes that keep them on the main roads, instead of going into all the residential backroads and side streets where they would get stuck. Do you think buses just drive whatever route they want, without any forethought? Actual planning goes into that route, not just for getting people from A to B, but also for ensuring the bus is physically able to fit. And school busses simply use different dimensions, to be able to expand their potential routes.
That would be easily solved with a Mansfield bar, should be mandatory on buses that high.
As i said in another comment, busses intentionally Doo not have Mansfield Bars so a vehicle rear ending the bus goes under instead of transferring all of the force of the impact into the bus.
As I said in another comment the american bus design is dumbass to begin with.
A Mansfield bar would still prevent decapitation on mild rear-end situation with a smaller car.
We are all personally responsible for the design of our vehicles so thank you for pointing that out we’ll bring it up at the next meeting
Yeah, busses carry people, not cargo.
If someone is dumb enough to not see the giant yellow thing covered in flashing lights and crash into it they deserve to eat steel.
Dumbass american take 🦅
Go take your angry ass back to reddit, begone bus-obsessed weirdo who must comment upon every comment.
I’d rather be bus-obsessed than say that “if you make a mistake, you deserve to die”
I’m okay with being a weirdo in the eyes of an american. I’ve seen what you worship.
Btw, I’m not the one who’s posting about reddit on Lemmy, so that’s a bit of a self-own on your part.
Correct! That’s the cheap option at least.
The expensive solution is to reduce the mass of the passenger vehicle and lower the bus. Maybe even put the engine of the bus in the back.
The bus is tall for two main reasons. First, to avoid getting high-centered on bumps. Since the rear wheels are fairly far forward on the bus, and the tail sticks out behind them so far. There’s a lot of vertical travel whenever the bus goes over bumps, like a lever arm being moved up and down. Notice that on a semi trailer, the wheels are near the very back of the trailer. But on a bus, the rear wheels are only about 3/4 back. This means that the tail of a bus can land on top of a steep hill (lifting the rear wheels off the ground, and effectively immobilizing the entire bus) if the tail is too low.
“Just move the rear wheels back, so the tail won’t land on anything” I hear some people starting to reply. Except that would inevitably prevent the bus from making necessary turns. Busses need to be able to fit into residential areas to pick up and drop off kids. Residential areas tend to have narrower streets, more street parking, and tighter turns. Semi trailers don’t need to fit into those smaller side streets, and are okay with a wider turn radius. So semi trailers are able to keep the wheels way back at the end of the trailer. But since a bus needs to be able to fit into those tighter residential areas, they need to have the wheels set closer to the front of the bus, so they can make those tighter turns.
Lastly (and I’d argue, most importantly), lowering the bus or reducing the mass would increase the risk to the kids inside of the bus. By allowing the car to slide under the bus, a lot of the kinetic energy is distributed vertically, (picking up the tail of the bus and pushing the rear-ending vehicle down) instead of directing it into crumpling the back of the bus. Because the back of a bus has very little room for crumple zones. The back seats are essentially right up against the rear wall of the bus. If you lower the bus and expect it to crumple, you’re going to crush kids. And a pragmatic engineer could easily argue that the design shouldn’t intentionally shatter twenty kids’ femurs just to save one negligent driver’s life.
Modern school bus designs are basically the culmination of engineering for a very specific set of requirements: 1) keep kids safe, 2) be able to fit into residential areas so the bus can pick up/drop off near the kids houses (which helps keep them safe), and 3) avoid getting high-centered on anything. And “keeping people who rear-end it safe” wasn’t on the list of requirements. A Mansfield bar at the back of the bus would defeat at least one of those requirements, by making high-centering much more common. The needs of the many (the kids) outweigh the needs of the few (the rear-ender) in this case.
Have you never been outside the US?
This is an explanation why the dumbass bus is shaped like it is, not whether it’s safer thaan the conventional bus designs, that the rest of the world uses.
Saying this can’t get over bumps or make tight turns is just being stuck up your own ass.
The US has busses like that too. They drive bus routes that keep them on the main roads, instead of going into all the residential backroads and side streets where they would get stuck. Do you think buses just drive whatever route they want, without any forethought? Actual planning goes into that route, not just for getting people from A to B, but also for ensuring the bus is physically able to fit. And school busses simply use different dimensions, to be able to expand their potential routes.
Wait, are you saying the US roads are too narrow for that type of bus?
The US just cannot use a metric bus! It’s not compatible!
Thank you for not giving a brain dead response. I saw so many people arguing for things that would get hundreds to thousands of kids killed.
Thank you for giving a braindead response whithout having a slightest clue what you’re talking about.
Tell me you have ADHD without telling me you have ADHD.
You’re 100% correct BTW.
Much text = smart. Must be the ADHDs.
Ok be real, we’re taking about the USA here, they’re not going to reduce the mass of anything.
Lol
Certainly not shootings.