Shuttle service abandons students

I have a big problem with transportation services. I live right across the street from campus, 42nd Street to be exact. I don’t like to point fingers, but I’m going to acuse parking services of causing my problems: It has something to do with their B route, or lack thereof.

The Bullrunner routes changed this year. B route no longer runs down that stretch of asphalt by the Sun Dome, Cooper Hall and the HMS, SOC, BEH, ULH and FAO building. (I know there are some business buildings over there too, I didn’t forget about you guys.) It doesn’t even run by the dorms anymore.

These are all pretty high traffic areas, foot and wheel alike, and now that there is no more B route, all the pressure is put on the C route.

Let’s face it: There is a large amount of students who live in that block across the street. I think more of them need to go to the buildings already mentioned than some little corner off to the side of campus. But now, these students need to wait for the C shuttle, which has been running 10-15 minutes behind schedule on top of the estimated 10-minute wait times. It also takes about 10 more minutes than the B route did to get to the Sun Dome area.

I never thought I would need to leave my house an hour before class when I live right across the street from campus. Sure I can walk, but no thanks, I would like to stay relatively dry.

The buses coming from campus have been packed to the gills. On Aug. 31, the driver of one bus made us wait at the stop for the next shuttle. The next shuttle came by 20 minutes later, and the driver said to wait for the next one. We protested and he let us on. We were crammed in to the point that I was sitting on the dashboard, resting my head against the windshield.

I called Parking and Transportation Services, and the reason the supervisor felt the need to change the routes was to better facilitate traffic on campus or something to that degree. Granted, this is still the first week, but come on kids, we’ve been doing this for a while now. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

John Mace is a juniormajoring in criminology.