Students cram into buses, leave no room to spare

Wow making the buses free makes them too crowded...didn't see this coming last year. This points to how shortsighted our parking and transit department really is. Not once did they give a straight answer as to if they had enough buses to meet demand on a fare free system. It's fairly obvious they don't. My guess is that we need atleast 10-20 more buses on route to handle demand, not the 4 more we are going to get this year. Look for parking and transit to come back this year for more money from students because we need MOAR BUSES and we just don't have enough to pay for them. I say we put our foot down, and demand a plan from them. No more increases in student fees to keep operations at their current level, etc. Make the parking department work harder to make this bus system smarter.

Increased ridership is great, but it's really sad hearing that people can't/won't ride the bus that they paid for because it's too crowded. Something needs to be done about this problem, but the solution won't be easy to come about.

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• Posted by sjschlag on September 4, 2008 at 10:07 a.m.
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Students cram into buses, leave no room to spare

This is exactly what the leadership of Students of Liberty told you. Thank you to the author for bringing this to light. OK people listen up. When you socialize anything, it gets over used and abused. That is a fact. As we exposed early on before the referendum went through, it was stated that yes it may cost $20 (to ride "free") plus $40-$50 (transportation fee) to support this system now but down the road they will incrementally add further fees and adding further buses. Instead of living within our means we begin to defeat the purpose of the bus system all together. Recall the socialized bus system now before this private corporation starts asking every student at KU to foot the bill for a required annual bus pass.

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• Posted by BaneMaler on September 4, 2008 at 11:40 a.m.
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Students cram into buses, leave no room to spare

Again, MV Transportation is not in charge of funding the buses, designing the routes, etc. KU on Wheels and the Parking and Transit department is. MV Transportation provides maintenance and drivers to run the buses. A fare free system is a good idea- it provides more convenient and efficient transportation (when the buses aren't full to the step well) than personal vehicles. There is no more space on campus to build additional parking garages or parking spaces, so providing students a ride to campus from their apartment complex is not such a bad idea. Where we went wrong was not developing a plan to purchase more buses before we went fare free, that would not raise our student fees. The merger between KU on Wheels and Lawrence Transit could alleviate some of these problems, with the possibility of more federal and state funding coming in. It's too bad that the City and KU have such a stand-offish relationship with eachother...we could build a very efficient system if both were willing to work with eachother to run some routes.

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• Posted by sjschlag on September 4, 2008 at 3:30 p.m.
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Students cram into buses, leave no room to spare

I'm furious. I was more than willing to pay for a bus pass to ensure I could get to campus in a timely manner like last year. And I'm still willing to pay. In the winter, I'll probably never be able to get on because all the Oliver kids will crowd it rather than walk when I live 40 minutes from campus on foot.

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• Posted by Hendrix321 on September 4, 2008 at 7:46 p.m.
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