Students are expected to ride in new buses when they return to school next month.

Public Transportation Board director Herman Basden yesterday told The Royal Gazette that the six new buses which arrived on the Island last month were running smoothly.

And he said: "We expect to have the other 14 buses when school opens.'' Mr. Basden noted that air conditioning problems detected in two of the first six buses had been solved.

"Freon had leaked out of one of the buses,'' he explained. "But that's been put in place and the bus is working. They are all ready to be on the road.'' During the past weekend an official from Suntrak, the company which made the buses' air conditioning system, arrived on the Island to check them and to train PTB mechanics in maintaining the system.

But Mr. Basden pointed out that the visit was arranged a month in advance and was the norm when new buses were purchased.

"A bus is six and a half tons to seven tons of lots of wire and fuses,'' he said. "When they are shipped, some things are bound to get shaken up. And the air conditioning system is made by someone else so when they came in they checked it out.'' The $250,000 buses, which have stainless steel rust-proof bodies made by Berkhos of Holland, are suitable for Bermuda's climate.

They also come as a welcome relief for PTB and the general public.

Many of PTB's buses date back to the mid-1970s. After Government did not set aside funds for the purchase of new buses in the 1995 Budget, crises struck the ageing public bus service in March.

More than 46 buses were taken off the road for repairs, leaving passengers stranded throughout the Island.

PTB was left to juggle the dwindling number of working buses during peak hours and parents complained about their youngsters being left stranded after buses failed to show up at their schools.

And Berkeley Institute's PTA began circulating a petition to get more buses to pick up students from the school.

PTA president Sylvia Lambert said yesterday that Transport Minister Wayne Furbert was presented with the petition -- signed by just under 200 people -- at the end of June.

"Out of that meeting we were assured of at least one extra bus and possibly another,'' Mrs. Lambert said. "So I'm quite happy as it stands and I'm still hopeful for that second one.''