School Superintendent Carol Johnson has released details of plans to ensure more students get to school on time in the coming school year.

For starters, BPS has already started mapping out bus routes for the fall, rather than waiting until later in the summer. BPS blamed new routing software for a busing crisis that saw hundreds of students getting to school seriously late, if their buses showed up at all.

Part of the planning process will involve making sure drivers actually have enough time to get from one stop to the next.

Also, transportation staff underwent customer-service training, more operators will be brought on in peak hours to actually talk to parents wondering where their kids are and the whole system has been tied into the Mayor's Hotline call-tracking system.

Also, BPS has declared June as BPS Bus Driver Appreciation Month. Parents and students will be asked to write letters of appreciation to their bus drivers, who work for a contractor named First Student. BPS will soon ask for bids to run its buses when First Student's contract expires next year.

An irate citizen reports from Mt. Ida Road in Dorchester:

This morning I parked under a sign that said I would be towed on the 1st and 3rd Thursday. It is the 4th Thursday. I came out to see my car being pulled onto a flatbed truck. The 'supervisor' driving a public works truck with license plate number MB 2278 said he could not cancel my ticket and that I had to dispute it. He also said "Life isn't perfect". They lowered my car off the flatbed truck and quickly drove away. This is the second time the signs on my street have been wrong. Please fix.

Inside the apartment. Photo by BFD.

Boston firefighters made short work of a fire at 321 Commonwealth Ave., reported around 9:30 a.m. The Boston Fire Department reports the fire broke out on the second floor of a five-story building.

The department says the fire, which did an estimated $100,000 in damage, started with a kitchen short circuit.