Hi, Gayle --

In more northerly climes, major winter snowstorms frequently force closings of museums. Schools, assuming they haven't closed, take this in stride and group visits are rescheduled. If the decision to close is made early enough, a staff member from the Education Dept. who has made it in to the office may be able to call the schools to let them know. 

More frequently than snow closings are the heavy rains or unexpectedly cold weather that force school groups, day care and senior center outings to suddenly switch plans from a outdoor museum or zoo to an indoor venue.  Everyone seems to be able to cope.  We used to joke about knowing the weather must have turned inclement without looking outside because the building would suddenly fill up with groups who'd originally planned to go to the zoo on what had started out as a lovely summer or autumn day.

Presumably there was a lot of media coverage (the California fires have been making the news out here) so either the bus company or the school would have learned about the problem in enough time to reroute if the Getty didn't get in contact to cancel.  If the closing were to occur too close to cancel scheduled visit, the tour(s)are likely stuck in humongous traffic jams and are eventually forced to turn back without realizing the museum was closed. 

Given that school bus companies and school districts are so dependent on each other, the deposit for the trip is probably fairly small. Having looked into bus rentals for different events over the years, the deposits and costs for school buses are modest compared to chartering other types of buses.So more problematical might be the situation for chartered tours or visitors to the LA area who cannot reschedule their trip to the Getty. 

Judy Turner
Whitefish Bay, WI 


--- On Thu, 10/23/08, Gayle <[log in to unmask]> wrote:

> From: Gayle <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: [MUSEUM-L] Fire Near the Getty Today
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Date: Thursday, October 23, 2008, 2:51 PM

> My question is, if you are faced with this kind of a
> situation, what happens to the school groups?  My thinking
> is that the schools had to pay for bus deposits that may be
> forefeited in this case because of last-minute notification
> to the bus company. 


      

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