Times were a lot different 50 plus years ago as well. My walk wasn't all that long, but the bus dropped me off on it's way back to town after dropping everyone else off.
My junior year in HS had me hitchhiking home after sports practice. HS was 7 miles from home. Fun times.
Say she walked 4 miles per hour (a very respectable pace), that would be 7 hour walk. Or, she could run over a marathon to get home, and assuming that she could hold the pace of a beginner runner (beginner for a marathon, not a beginner in training for a marathon or doing 1/2 marathons), it would only be 4.5 hours I mean, I know we have kids that sit on the bus quite a long time, but that is a combination of all the stops, having a co-op that covers 4 towns, and having fewer busses than what would be ideal. It may not be so much a function of distance. Although, you ain't cutting cross country in the mountains, trees and areas of heavy brush, swamps etc. Additionally, there are only two bridges across the Contoocook river (2.5 miles apart), and one snowmobiling bridge another 1.5 miles). If they stayed to roads, I guess distance actually adds up. especially since there are very few straight roads. As the crow flies, the farthest from the school would be 10-12 miles.
Guess they are leaving tomorrow to get her on the bus by 5:30 and returning about 8 pm for a school tennis match. Idk, missing school a whole day ontop of being up over 17 hours bothers me. Only ~1-2 weeks left for Tennis season but I'm not down with this. Homework? Sleep? Tired kids the next day at school? Idk.
I'll guess 9 month - 1 year. I would just die if this was my last winter out here. There's bathrooms and a tiny sink in the offices part on the south, but we need our own full bathrooms and kitchen. First steps are plumbing, need to bring water north to where we'll be, and likely run a new sewer line west. Then, electrician. Husband said he would start framing this winter but we scrapped a lot of the construction and will use the existing small offices ( +/- 10x10' ) as is. One room instead of building laundry room and storage will just remain open with both shelves and W/D in there. The biggest room he's going to hang insulated metal paneling on the outside instead of insulation in the wall. That same room sliding glass door will replace the 1910 barn doors to the courtyard. Next to that replace window to courtyard. On the street side a front door will go where there's a loading dock door, and two windows for egress. We'll have to hire someone for brick steps to loading dock height ~3' ? to match the ones at the office entrance. Then, interior things. Kitchen and bath fixtures, kitchen cabinets, drywall, flooring, paint. As $$ allows.