MCPS Says Every Bus Depot Is Over Capacity. Next Year, Some Buses Will Park at Its Own Properties.

Montgomery County Public Schools says it is running out of places to park its school buses, and that next school year it will park some of them at its own properties that will not be operating as schools.

“ALL current transportation depots are operating exceeding capacity,” according to a slide in the capital budget presentation MCPS staff gave the Board of Education on Oct. 15 (slide 26). “As a result: MCPS will need to utilize its existing properties to park buses in School Year 2027-2028.”

Why MCPS needs more space

The presentation gives three reasons on the same slide:

• Every depot is over capacity now.
• The fleet has to grow in 2027-28. MCPS says it needs more buses “to fulfill boundary and program transition phase.” An earlier slide (slide 25) says the fleet must grow “at least in the short term to support ‘grandfathering’ students for continuity in boundary and program changes,” meaning students allowed to stay at their current schools while new boundaries and programs phase in.
• It is losing its Shady Grove depot. The slide cites a “County expectation that MCPS will vacate Shady Grove Depot site.”

MCPS says it is reviewing “existing facilities with significant parking that will not be active schools in SY 2027–2028” to decide where buses can go until longer-term solutions are “finalized and funded.” The presentation does not name any sites.

The Shady Grove move is already costing more

Separately, the county is paying to move about 250 MCPS buses out of the Shady Grove depot on Crabbs Branch Way to leased sites at 861 East Gude Drive and 14825 Old Dover Road in Rockville. As Moderately MOCO reported Tuesday, County Executive Marc Elrich has asked the County Council for $15.5 million more for that move, bringing its total to $31.56 million, up from last year’s estimate of $16.06 million. The Council holds a public hearing on the request Nov. 10 at 1:30 p.m.

The long-term plan is years away

For a permanent fix, MCPS wants regional transportation facilities. The district identified two properties for them in its current six-year capital plan, but “funding for planning and design was deferred to FY 2030,” the presentation says (slide 25). Its project table (slide 21) shows $40 million for “Transportation and Regional Support Facilities”: $5 million in fiscal 2030, $15 million in fiscal 2031 and $20 million in fiscal 2032.

The new plan no longer names those two sites. One of them was Wootton ES Site #7, a 12-acre property on Cavanaugh Drive in Rockville that the Board of Education has long held for a future elementary school. Neighbors there organized against a bus depot; their group, No Bus Depot, says more than 1,500 people signed its petition. In the FY 2028 recommended plan, Site #7 appears only on the list of Board-owned future school sites (Appendix I).

At the Board’s Oct. 15 work session, a Board member asked whether the two sites were still planned. “This recommendation does unspecify those two projects,” an MCPS staff member answered, according to the Board’s webcast. “We are no longer saying those are the specific two sites, but I would also caution that we are saying we are looking at all the sites,” including those two. MCPS has also hired a real estate consultant to look for commercial sites, staff said, adding that “we are literally out of space.”

MCPS also says it will review possible locations “in the context of all Board-owned properties and in the context of the closure and consolidation portfolio review,” tying the bus question to its study of possible school closures and consolidations. MCPS says no schools have been selected for closure; the Board of Education is scheduled to vote on closures in April 2027.

What happens next

• Nov. 10: County Council public hearing on the $15.5 million for the Shady Grove bus move
• Nov. 19: Board of Education vote on the capital budget amendments that include the transportation projects

The presentation does not say which properties MCPS is considering or how many buses it expects to add in 2027-28.

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