Lower Merion's State-Champion School Bus Driver in National Competition

For Lower Merion School District bus driver John Welsh, the 23rd time was a charm.

After 23 years of competing each year in the Pennsylvania School Bus Safety Competition, Welsh placed first overall in the 2011 state competition in State College on June 25, as well as first in the transit style division.

Welsh will now go onto the national bus safety competition Saturday and Sunday in Baltimore.

“I feel great about winning the state competition mainly because I’ve never won it before although I’ve been competing for 23 years,” the Havertown resident said.

Welsh—who is also a driver instructor who trains other Lower Merion school bus drivers how to drive buses safely—said he has qualified for nationals three other times, but the third time he was not able to participate because his father was ill.

Three other local bus drivers also competed in the state competition.

Lower Merion School District drivers Ted Dubbs of Collingdale and Beth McGowan of Havertown placed 4th and 8th respectively in the state bus derby, said Mary Ann Collins, an administrative secretary for Lower Merion School District’s Transportation Department.

“We’re extremely proud and pleased that our drivers did so well,” said Richard Segal, safety foreman for the Lower Merion School District’s Transportation Department, said of Welsh, Dubbs and McGowan.

Jim O’Toole, a Havertown resident and a bus driver for Haverford Township School District, said he placed 9th in the competition. 

There are two divisions in the competition: transit style, which involves driving a transit-style bus in which the wheels are located behind the bus driver’s seat, and conventional, in which competitors drive conventional-style school buses which have wheels located in front of the bus driver’s seat, Welsh said.

Welsh, Dubbs, McGowan and O’Toole all competed in the transit-style division.

The competition includes a written test, another test in which each competitor has six minutes to look at a school bus and determine five things that are wrong with the bus (such as a leak under the bus or a nail in a tire), and a driving test with a “whole variety of obstacles,” Welsh said.

Segal said the obstacle course involves maneuvering the school bus through tight spaces and it sets apart the average driver from the superior driver.

“It’s almost like threading a needle with a school bus,” Segal said.

The obstacle course includes events such as parallel parking the bus.  “The space is only six feet bigger than the school bus and you’re expected to get within 12 inches of the curb or less,” Welsh said.

There is also a “docking alley” event in which each competitor must drive the bus in reverse through a restrictive space in which there is not much room to maneuver, Welsh said.

The “stop line event” simulates the school bus picking up children, Welsh said. A driver must stop within two inches of a line that has been placed on the ground for the competition, he said.

Welsh and O’Toole said they practiced together for the state competition and they also planned to get together on Tuesday so that O’Toole could help Welsh train for the nationals.

“Although John is a competitor of mine, John and I have become good friends and he has helped me tremendously,” O’Toole said of Welsh.

O’Toole, who placed fourth in the 2010 state bus derby and advanced to the 2010 nationals, said he was not happy with his 9th place state finish this year.

“I know I could do better and I don’t know what happened,” O’Toole said. “As John and I would say, I missed my marks in the competition.”

 But O’Toole had only praise for Welsh.

“John is a good driver and first of all, he’s a very good person,” O’Toole said.  “I really can’t emphasize enough how much John is a good person and a gracious person.”