UniteGPS helps K-12 transportation teams plan school bus routes, optimize school bus fleet capacity, reduce daily mileage, and communicate route changes with confidence. Built from real district feedback, the platform combines routing, SIS integration, optimization studies, board-ready reporting, and hands-on support so transportation directors can replace spreadsheets, paper maps, and legacy tools with one practical system.
Everything districts need to build, optimize, document, and improve school bus routes from one connected platform.
Build and manage bus routes straight from your student data — assign students to stops and zones, support transfer points, double runs, and day-of-the-week routing for split-custody and dual-address students, and drag stops between routes instantly.
Learn More →Analyze your existing routes to find consolidations, eliminate redundant routes, and cut daily mileage and student ride time — with before-and-after overlays and documented dollar savings to defend route changes to your board.
Learn More →The engine behind optimization: it rebalances student loads across your school bus fleet within hard constraints — capacity caps, maximum ride time, and bell windows — and proposes consolidation scenarios for your team to review and approve.
Learn More →A daily data feed from your student information system — PowerSchool, Infinite Campus, Skyward, or Harmony — that works even without the SIS transportation module, flagging new students, address changes, and disenrollments in one action center and bulk-importing staff.
Parent messaging by email and SMS: send each family their stop and pickup or drop-off times, broadcast route changes, and handle weather and emergency alerts — replacing manual phone trees and a pile of separate apps.
Learn More →A shared trip calendar with a request-and-approval workflow (secretary → AD → principal), Google Calendar export, and bus and driver assignment checked against your daily routes.
UniteGPS connects with your student information system or imports student data to create a reliable routing foundation. Daily updates help flag new students, address changes, and disenrollments before they disrupt transportation planning.
Routes are built from student addresses, stops, zones, bell schedules, transfer points, and vehicle capacity. Transportation teams can drag stops between routes, manage double runs, and create printable sheets for regular and sub drivers.
The optimization engine reviews load balance, ride time, mileage, bell windows, and capacity caps. It proposes consolidation scenarios that your team approves, so recommendations stay practical for real-world district operations.
UniteGPS packages optimization findings into clear before-and-after overlays, mileage comparisons, load factors, and savings estimates. These reports help transportation leaders explain route changes to superintendents, boards, and community stakeholders.
A named implementation contact helps configure the system, train users, and support adoption. Districts can begin with routing, then add GPS, parent apps, tablets, ridership tracking, or inspections as needs evolve.
See how districts use UniteGPS to reduce calls, defend savings, and run transportation with better data.
UniteGPS combines practical routing tools, real support, and long-term product focus. We don't just sell you software and walk away — we stay, we share what we know, and we help you build a transportation operation your district can be proud of.
Every feature comes from real district conversations, not investor-driven roadmaps or generic logistics software.
Every feature comes from real district conversations, not investor-driven roadmaps or generic logistics software.
UniteGPS serves 100+ school districts across the United States with practical transportation tools.
FERPA-compliant workflows help protect student transportation data while supporting parent communication and reporting.
In-house support, named implementation contacts, and driver training keep adoption moving without ticket queues.
Founder-led transportation technology built from real district needs.
Co-Founder
Christopher Bunnell is a Co-Founder of UniteGPS, the company he helped launch in 2014 after watching his own children wait in the freezing Maine winter for a school bus with no arrival information. Driven by that firsthand frustration, Chris partnered with Steve C. Lanning and Steven J. Lanning to build a real-time GPS tracking solution that gave families the visibility they deserved. Before UniteGPS, Chris served as the on-site client representative in Baltimore for a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services project, while the technical team operated remotely from California. At UniteGPS, Chris has led client relationships and stakeholder engagement since day one, ensuring the platform continues to solve real problems for school districts and transit agencies nationwide.
Co-Founder
Steve C. Lanning is a Co-Founder of UniteGPS, bringing deep database architecture and enterprise-level technical expertise to the platform since its founding in 2014. Steve previously served as an Oracle database administrator on a Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services project at the San Diego Supercomputer Center at UC San Diego, where he first collaborated with Chris Bunnell. In the early years of UniteGPS, Steve balanced the project alongside other professional commitments until growing client traction made it a full-time pursuit. His database expertise has been instrumental in building a reliable, scalable platform that now serves over 100 school districts nationwide, supporting everything from route optimization to student ridership tracking and SIS data integration.
Co-Founder
Steven J. Lanning is a Co-Founder of UniteGPS and the primary architect behind the Crosswalk platform, which he has built and continuously refined since the company's founding in 2014. Steven began his career on the same Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services project as his co-founders, focusing on solution quality assurance and software testing for production readiness while simultaneously pursuing formal software development training. When UniteGPS launched, Steven committed full-time to product development, translating real feedback from transportation directors and drivers into practical platform features. His customer-driven approach to engineering has helped UniteGPS grow into a fully integrated transportation management solution trusted by K-12 districts and transit agencies across the United States.
Often, yes. A free route optimization study analyzes your routes and returns a documented savings plan plus an independent outside assessment for your board — not just software output. For a mid-size district it's fairly standard to find $300,000 to $500,000, and eliminating a single route saves roughly $40,000 to $50,000 a year.
It's still worth a look. Even when there may be little to consolidate, the study gives you an independent outside assessment you can take to the board, and a two-tier bell schedule can often add capacity without adding drivers.
That's handled with day-of-the-week routing — a student can ride Route 2 during week A and Route 3 during week B, or use different stops on different days, for split-custody and dual-address situations.
Very little heavy lifting on your end — we set up your routes for you so you don't feel overwhelmed by a big project. A named implementation contact builds your routes with you and trains drivers to adoption, and the free 90-day setup covers it.
Yes. We run a daily data feed from your student information system — PowerSchool, Infinite Campus, Skyward, or Harmony. It works even if you don't have the SIS transportation module, and it can still identify who's a bus rider. A daily action center flags new students, address changes, and disenrollments so your routes stay current.
Neither — there's no first-year gimmick, and nobody's expected to work for free. We set up your routes and your data feed at no cost for 90 days to take the risk out of the decision, and if you don't continue, you keep the routing we built. Billing is year-to-year with annual invoicing, and at the GPS tier the GPS devices are included free.
Yes. Contracts are year-to-year with annual invoicing — not a five-year lock-in — and we put that in writing on the quote, so districts whose board or attorney restricts long-term agreements can move forward without exceeding their term limits.
A real person. It's not a chatbot and it's not outsourced to an overseas call center — it's somebody in our own organization. One director said they'd met at least five of our team, compared with a prior vendor they spoke to once in five years.
Get practical answers from a team that understands school transportation.
Student privacy compliance for transportation workflows.
Trusted by districts across the United States.
Student privacy compliance for transportation workflows.
Trusted by districts across the United States.
Transportation software refined since 2014.
