School buses, taxis and special education routes were cancelled in Waterloo region on Monday due to snow, although schools remained open.
“Families may choose to keep their child(ren) home if they feel it is unsafe to travel to school. If you keep your child home, please call the school to report their absence,” the Waterloo Region District School Board said on its website.
Buses in Guelph and Wellington County were operating on Monday.
It comes after the first snowfall of the season in Waterloo region over the weekend and foggy conditions in some parts Monday morning.
Flurries are in the Environment Canada forecast for the region over the next week.
Benoit Bourgault is the general manager at Student Transportation Services of Waterloo Region. He explained cancellation calls are made early by spotters who live across the region and review the road conditions in their areas.
“Then based on that assessment, the bus operators will inform us of the condition and make a recommendation as to whether we should run or not. And from that then we either run or cancel service, either partial or complete cancellation of service based on conditions, forecast temperature and so on,” he told CBC News in an interview.
Bourgault also said poor conditions in one part of the region may lead to cancellations, even when things may not look as bad in other parts of Waterloo region.
“We may have enough snow in the north part or in the south part of the region that would cause us to cancel because the municipality takes up to 24 hours to clear all the roads,” he said.
“We’ve seen that sometimes, we have significant dump of snow overnight and by 10:00 in the morning, it’s sunny; however, the roads were very slippery and that would have been unsafe to do the run in the morning.”
Police were reminding people to take care when on the roads Monday morning and that vehicles should be cleared of snow.