INDIANAPOLIS The ground transportation management company that coordinated the transporting of college athletes to sports tournaments this past year as part of a pilot program for the National Collegiate Athletic Association has won a contract to continue the program.

GO Ground Options of Chicago will manage the Bus Operator Network Program under a long-term contract issued by the NCAA, which hired the company last year to test the procedure it hopes would enhance the safe transportation of student athletes.

Under the program, only motorcoach companies that have passed safety inspections required by GO Ground will be allowed to take sports teams to tournaments, playoffs and championship games sponsored and paid for by the NCAA.

Also, operators that join the program and provide charters for teams during the high-demand periods of November, March and May will be given priority for high-profile championship events such as the Final Four college basketball tournament.

Motorcoach operators currently transporting college sports teams to their regular season games and other activities will be able to continue to do so without joining the program.

However, for post-season play, the schools are being prohibited by the NCAA from using any charter company that is not part of the program.

"We needed to consolidate ground transportation for our championships," said Juanita Sheely, NCAA associate director for travel and insurance. "GO Ground demonstrated they had the technology platform and industry experience to help us accomplish this."

To become certified for the program, carriers will have to pay for and pass a new inspection conducted by Transportation Safety Exchange, a newly formed bus safety marketing and sales business with ownership ties to Consolidated Safety Services.

CSS is widely known in the motorcoach industry and has for more than 20 years managed a bus inspection program for the U.S. Department of Defense.

The inspection standards developed for the NCAA program by TSX are more stringent than those used for bus inspections currently conducted by both CSS and the Federal Motor Carrier Safety Administration.

Among the upgrades is the inspection of a companys entire fleet, instead of only the specific coaches that might be used for team charters; full-fleet inspections every two years, and monthly reviews of each carriers operations using data gathered by federal transportation regulators.

Operators will be required to pay a $500 application fee to join the program and then pay an inspection fee based on the size of their fleet.

Typical operators those with 9 to 15 coaches that sign up for the program will pay a discounted rate of $4,200 for the inspection of their buses and will be allowed to pay the fee in four payments over a 24-month period rather than the full amount at one time.

Under the pilot program, the fee was $6,500 and it had to be paid in full.

Both of those requirements have been changed for the permanent program because of complaints raised by operators that took part in the pilot program.

The NCAA began the program as a pilot last year following an extensive investigation by the sports television network ESPN, which found that a number of major colleges that switched to charter bus transportation for financial reasons were using carriers with questionable safety records.

Ohio State, Michigan State, San Jose State, UCLA, Alabama, Nebraska and Oklahoma were among those cited in the investigation.

"We will be taking bus transportation to the highest level of safety the industry has ever seen," Sheely emphasized. "Safety is the one area where we will not compromise. If the bus charter company doesnt meet our safety standards were not using them. Either operators meet the standards or they dont."

In addition to the new safety standards, she said the program is expected to help control costs by shrinking the pool of companies that will be used.

"Our goal now is that we can even things out. We dont want someone in St. Louis and someone in Pittsburgh having a $1,000-a-day difference. There will probably be a little variation, but it shouldnt be the variations weve been seeing," she stressed.

She said the NCAA saw a 25- to 30-percent cost savings for transportation expenses during the pilot period.

GO Ground founder Bill Maulsby noted that while safety is the key component of the program, charter fees that member companies will be charging the NCAA is an important element as well. "GO Ground has fought hard to bring the costs down," he said.

He declined to discuss details of the program, saying the contract and the companys relationship with the NCAA is private.

The NCAA also would not provide details of some aspects of the program, including the number and names of the companies that bid for the contract.

"The bidding process is confidential, not only from an NCAA standpoint but from the other companies standpoint as well," said spokesman Greg Johnson. "I was told that there were multiple companies involved in the bidding process."

While the pilot program operated by G0 Ground received high marks from the NCAA, it did not sit well with a number of motorcoach company executives who questioned the need for another costly safety inspection program, and worried they might lose the regular college transportation work they now have if they do not join the program.

Now that the program has been made permanent, many of those concerns are resurfacing, mainly from state motorcoach associations in the South and Southeast.

Linda Morris, who manages several state and regional trade groups, said the program appears to be a move toward turning the motorcoach industry into a broker-run business similar to the trucking industry. (See a signed article by Morris in the Nov. 1 Bus & Motorcoach News.)

She also contends that some companies that have joined the program - Maulsby said more than 100 have been recruited - did so under the threat of losing the transportation contracts they currently have with colleges.

The NCAA, which stressed that motorcoach operators that have existing college contracts are welcome to apply for the program, said colleges were given an opportunity this month to recommend carriers for the program and they will be given a second opportunity this winter in advance of some tournament play.

It did add, however, that colleges do have the option of using GO Ground and its member carriers for team transportation that is not paid by the NCAA.

Operators can contact GO Ground at by email at NCAANetwork@gogroundoptions.com, Maulsby can be contacted at bmaulsby@gogroundoptions.com.