Newsroom
For many families, the school bus is meant to remove one problem from an already hectic morning. In parts of Larnaca, it has become another question altogether: Will it actually arrive?
Parents say scheduled school routes have been repeatedly cancelled since the new school year began, sometimes leaving students without a way to get to class and families searching for last-minute alternatives.
The latest concern involves Alethriko, where parents were informed that a school route would not operate on Thursday.
The Larnaca Federation of Secondary School Parents and Guardians says the disruption is affecting hundreds of students across the district. It is calling on the Transport Ministry to step in and ensure that all agreed routes operate safely and consistently.
Parents argue that this is not a free favor being offered to families. They pay for the service and organize their working day around it.
When a bus fails to arrive, the problem does not end at the bus stop. A parent may have to leave work, call relatives or neighbors, arrange an unexpected taxi, or accept that their child could be late or miss school entirely.
Families want reliability, not daily uncertainty
The federation says the cancellations have continued despite repeated complaints and that no permanent solution has been provided.
Parents have also acknowledged concerns over inappropriate behavior on some school buses and say they have condemned such incidents in the past. However, they argue that misconduct by some passengers cannot be used to remove transport from every student on a route.
Their position is simple: deal with those responsible, but do not leave other children stranded.
Cyprus Public Transport provides information on school services through its website, but as of Thursday morning its public announcements page did not include a specific explanation for the reported Alethriko cancellation.
It was also not immediately clear how many routes have been cancelled since the start of the school year, how much notice families received or what arrangements are being offered to affected students.
Those are now the questions parents want both the operator and the Transport Ministry to answer.
The federation is asking for the immediate restoration of all affected routes and a long-term plan to prevent the same disruption from happening again.
*Sources: Larnaca Federation of Secondary School Parents and Guardians; Cyprus Public Transport
