Since Monday October 26 Sassari’s school bus service has been able to operate at full capacity, following difficulties during the first weeks of school. The announcement came from Mayor Giuseppe Mascia and Councillor for School Policies Nicoletta Puggioni: the successful bidder has added the vehicles needed to operate the scheduled routes.
At the start of operations, the company had reported having 11 school buses, compared with the 24 required. According to the Municipality, the vehicles available allowed it to cover just over half of the service. The shortage caused difficulties for families and led to routes 13 and 21 being temporarily combined.
To address the emergency, the administration had put five municipal school buses back into service, describing them as not new but still usable. Adding these buses helped ease the difficulties, but did not prevent some runs from being combined. In the meantime, the Municipality applied the penalties stipulated in the contract for the company’s failure to meet its commitments.
The contracted service includes the use of 24 vehicles to cover 21 routes, as well as the presence of drivers and assistants on board. The European tender covers the school years from 2026/2027 to 2029/2030, with the option to extend the contract for a further four school years. The tender was published on March 16, 2026, and the winning company was selected in May.
School transport was due to begin on September 21, coinciding with the start of the service for the school year. A guide to the 2026/27 school year in Sardinia is also available for the academic calendar.
“In recent days, additional vehicles have been brought in, and from today we will finally be able to provide the full service smoothly,” Mascia and Puggioni said in the Municipality’s statement, published on October 26. The administration thus announced that all routes would be covered following the arrival of the missing vehicles and the application of contractual penalties.