The Wheels on the Mortobus Don't Go Round and Round

I love this New York Times story about Italian kids taking the bus as they walk to school in Italy.

That is, kids walk to school on "bus routes" led and chaperoned by adults. These are piedibuses: "pedestrian buses."

Each bus has its own name; pictured above is the mortobus ("death bus") which takes a shortcut through the graveyard in the town of Lecco. These kids master street safety, get exercise, and manage not to contribute to global warming on their way to and from school.

Plus, think of the sights they see! (The most chilling line from the article wasn't about the death bus. It was this: "Children whose parents drive a lot will become car-dependent adults.")