Thoughts on Transportation
Where there any interesting interactions as you surveyed students on transportation issues? What do you think are the best ways to encourage students to do more carpooling, car-sharing, bus-riding, etc?
posted by UVM Eco-Reps Program Coordinator @ 10:46 AM
25 Comments:
Most of the people I interviewed already knew about the free CATMA services offered to students. I think that the best way to encourage students to car-pool and ride buses comes right down to taking those actions yourself. I lead by example and if I show my roommate or my friends that I am riding the bus then maybe I will inspire just one more person to put down the car keys and jump on the bus. Just last week I showed my friend a copy of the CATMA bus schedule and that the bus stops just outside his house. I was pleased to hear that he no longer has to walk to campus and that he can just jump on the Essex bus every morning.
-Caroline Shepard
I've used rideshare a lot and always noticed that there are way more people looking for rides than offering them. One thing I noticed in doing the survey was that a lot of people that had never used rideshare said they didn't use it because they didn't need to- they drove themselves places. I asked if they'd ever thought to offer others a ride to where they were going, and most said they didn't know they could do that on rideshare, they thought it was only for people looking for rides! (Which perplexes me a little, because a site of just people looking for rides would never work without someone to offer rides!).
I think talking about transportation by doing this survey was a great start to raising awareness. I was able to tell lots of people about rideshare and even convinced a housemate to take the bus instead of driving to work after helping her look up the bus schedule! I think the "InStallments" help too- when I asked one student if he knew about the free CCTA buses, he said yes, and he'd also read about it in the bathroom!
I had a dream last night about giving the survey to a student who didn't know about free buses and drove absolutely everywhere. Actually, I guess it was more of a nightmare. Now I can tell students about the "weird dream" I had and spread the message even more (ok, I think I'm kidding there, but I really did dream about it).
So I forgot my name, but the comment about the dream about giving the survey was from Kae.
I, too, found that most people know that CATMA services are free to students. I also found that many students who have a car claimed that they, "felt bad about it." I do realize the convenience of having a car, but I think we can certainly encourage people to make use public transportation and CarShareTV by continually advertising and sharing the appeal of using such resources.
There were a few people who had never heard of rideshare before and when I explained what it was, they were very interested in it. I was actually talking to my friend about how she didn't know how she was getting home for break and I suggested rideshare. She went on the website and noticed that there were a lot of people looking for rides, but not a lot of people offering them. I agree with Kae in that it should be advertised more that rideshare is also a place to offer rides and not only receive rides. I also think having a consistent and reliant bus schedule would make more students take the bus.
-Natalie Bishop
The majority of students i interviewed had heard of the CATMA buses but had not heard of ride-share. However, those who had had very good things to say about it. Some students, including myself, had experienced and taken advantage of similar programs in Europe, and were excited that it has made its way to Burlington, VT!
The L/L group set up a table in the Fire Place lounge to distribute yogurt-compost bins and asked visitors if they wouldn't mind filling out a survey. This worked well!
-Hedda
I was really happy to find out that most people did know that the city buses are free. People seem to use them a lot, which is great. I think that in terms of rideshare, most people did not use it because they were either unaware that it existed or were scared. This could be solved with some better advertising, or a shift in thinking about sharing a car with a stranger. I've also told everyone I know about carshare, and signed up with a bunch of friends. We haven't used it yet, but plan on doing so very soon. Everyone I told was super psyched on carshare, so hopefully that will be really successful. In general, I think the city and school have been doing a really good job of getting cars off of the streets.
- Jenna
Where there any interesting interactions as you surveyed students on transportation issues? What do you think are the best ways to encourage students to do more carpooling, car-sharing, bus-riding, etc?
I think alot/most of the students know about the public transportation (i.e. campus bus, CCTA) that is offered to UVM students, which is a good thing. However, alot of them would complain about how a good amount of the time the CCTA buses tend to not be on time. But at the same time it's usually very cold and the buses are free so they still think it's a good service.
Not alot of the kids knew about the new Car Share Vermont program so I think it's definitely something Ecoreps should work on getting the word out since it's such a great program, especially for college kids.
As others have said, the main way is to just lead by example. We always say in Ecoreps how the best way to change peoples habits is by showing off your own (i.e. re-usable mug and water bottle) so transportation is the same way. Also, in terms of the Car Share Vermont Program, I think as EcoReps we can help spread the knowledge base of transportation opportunities out to students on campus, which will also encourage people to carpool and use the buses more.
-Sam Ethridge
It seems to me like people are pretty happy with the transportation in the area. The majority of people I've interviewed do not have cars on campus, and it definitely doesn't seem as if they have a huge desire to, either.
I think that UVM Rideshare could use some more advertising. There were people who hadn't heard of it, and just the fact that some people can completely not know anything of it to me shows that it should be more visible on campus. Of course, this would probably increase the rides offered, so it could turn into an even more valuable tool.
The recommendations for the city buses were good, I thought. I think that if they ran later hours, that would be really appreciated (someone spoke of a friend who would leave downtown parties with no bus to ride, and she'd have to walk home alone really late). Although there wasn't a strong frustration with the timing of the buses, it seems like more postings of times and an assurance that each bus would ride on time (I have found that they really are fairly true to their schedule).
I think that one of the best pieces of advice somebody had was the idea of an off-campus bus going through campus. I think that this happens during weekends, but not during the week. It would be interesting to see how much this would be used, but if it would stop people from driving downtown or to University Mall or anywhere else during the school days, that would be really neat. Overall, I'm optimistic about how UVM's transportation is. There is certainly a lot of walking around, which is great for both ourselves and the planet!
--Page
I think the best improvement for transportation is to get someone (even a student) to keep the RIDESHARE website in check. There are posts from months ago which make people looking at the site worried about the reliability of the site. This would be an easy job and I am sure if shown how one of us could update it also.
The bus system seems to be beneficial to all students because they are free. I think in the wintertime the most visited places are the ski mountains, I know the ski and snowboard club has a few buses that go. However, these buses go once a week, maybe improving these to both weekend days would inspire less people to drive.
-Rachel Brooks
I found that most of the people I interviewed new about Ride Share and the free use of the CCTA buses. However most people that knew about Ride Share still had not used it, or were slightly skeptical of the service in general, as more of a safety issue. I think that to encourage the students to use the service more often it needs to be advertised as a legitimate and helpful service. Another thing I found interesting was that most if not all the freshman who cannot have a car on campus still relied on walking more than busing, which is great. It was helpful, I think, for the students to learn about transportation through the survey especially because as Eco-Reps we can answer any questions they have and encourage the use of Ride Share.
Sarah
I also realized that people know a lot about the free CATMA services. What most people don't realize I have discovered is how far these buses go. Most people assume they only go to downtown burlington and south burlington. A lot of people reported having cars also, but most said they didn't use them that often. It seems that the advertising CATMA more and getting the knowledge out there about where it can take you would be beneficial.
-Kristen
While interviewing people with the transportation survey I found that most people knew of rideshare but they did not know how it works. A lot of people also stated that they had not used it because they found their own rides through friends. Everyone knew that the CATMA buses are free and several people expressed how that made getting to work (downtown) a lot easier, especially at night. When looking at the routes further myself, I was surprised how far they go! This is something that could be advertised more to people so they don't feel that they need a car to go outside of Burlington.
-Lisa
I did alot of my surveying in the greenhouse, where I live, so many of the people I interviewed were very familiar with it. However I did talk to alot of people who had cars, and they seemed to REALLY enjoy having one on campus, and I started wondering ways to encourage people to leave their cars behind. I also went over to Redstone to interview people, where most people also were familiar with the bus system and also seemed to use the on-campus busses more. Most people I interviewed didnt use rideshare, because they were either creeped out by it, or already had a carpool established with people from their hometown.
-Kate Resch
Where there any interesting interactions as you surveyed students on transportation issues? What do you think are the best ways to encourage students to do more carpooling, car-sharing, bus-riding, etc?
The majority of the people I interviewed new that the buses were free, but rarely used them. I think being s sophomore, there are more of us that have cars or at least have friends that do so they do not rely as much on them. However, I take them every tues/thurs to work, so people are using them!
Not a lot of people knew about rideshare and those that did were skeptical about using it. I don't know if I would ever use it personally, just because i do not feel comfortable riding with a stranger, which I think is the main reason people do not use it.
I think that just having us remind people to carpool home/ about the buses is the best we can do. Most people already do carpool, so i think that we are doing a good job keeping people aware.
~Briana
After doing the survey I found out that everyone I had surveyed knew that the Burlington buses (CCTA) were free for UVM students and most of the people had heard of Ride Share. However, I think most people did not actually use Ride Share because in a way it seems intimidating and they would rather go home with someone they knew. Furthermore, most people seem to be using the buses a lot more this semester than last semester due to the cold weather. In addition, very few people knew of the Car Share program here at Vermont yet when I told them about it they seemed very interested, yet also somewhat cautious about how much money they might actually spend doing it and if it would be worth it. I agree with some of the other eco-reps in that one of the major ways to promote Ride Share and Car Share is to set the example yourself and then also keep mentioning it to people so hopefully it will spread through word of mouth.
-Steph Kiesow
i found that many of the students i spoke to knew about ride share and had already worked out their own systems of transportation for longer distance travel. so that was great! the overall feeling from most all students i talked to was that the bus times needed to be better displayed and more concrete-- felt that due to the inconsistencies in timing, they would rather just not use the bus, when they would like to.
--leigha
While surveying students, i found many of them did know about the CATMA program and all the free transportation around Burlington. The thing I found is that students used the word "inconvienent" in replace of "lazy." I came to the conclusion that most students simply did not want to travel on someone elses schedule. Most the students i talked to that rode the bus, rode the bus because they did not have a car not because they were concerned about their footprint. Having downtown bus stops on campus i think would one idea to promote bus usage(not sure how realistic). Students would be able to routinely see the buses around campus and think to actually use the services that are given to use.
-Jim
The biggest thing that came about during my transportation survey was the lack of knowledge about Ride Share. Many people knew what it was, but not really how to participate in it. Many people were apprehensive about participating because they were scared of riding with someone they didn't know because it would be weird, awkward, etc.
I think the best way to go about changing this reputation would be to improve the advertising for this service in order to attract more people, as well as cleaning up the website (run by SGA) so that more kids would trush the service.
-Olivia Bulger
One of the first residents I surveyed said, in response to the RideShare question, said "Yeah I know about RideShare, but what about Carshare? Is that on your survey? I think that would be a good thing for people to know about." And so for most of the rest of the surveying, I tried to sneak the CarShare discussion in somehow. It was important to clarify the difference between RideShare and CarShare for some. I was really glad that that resident suggested talking about CarShare, because not too many people knew what it was.
In terms of encouraging more carpooling, etc. I think that making RideShare a bit more accessible and more a part of the "UVM lifestyle" if you will, is important. For bus-riding, there was a lot of feedback on how difficult it is to get a clear schedule/ route from CCTA and Campus Transportation. I've actually run into a similar problem with the T in Boston. It takes a while to figure out how exactly to work and read the websites. Maybe better formatting would help...
There were also many suggestions for a CCTA route that came to Redstone Campus. Many didn't think it feasible, but it would be oh so nice!
-Mike Verla
Definitely the most common question asked while students filled out the survey was, "What's Ride Share?" It seems to me that, although we flyer for Ride Share before breaks and such, it would greatly benefit the student body if we did more PR on the program. Also, I feel like when I did explain the concept of Ride Share, people were not that enthusiastic about it. I think a great goal for Eco-Reps would be to work on making ideas such as Ride Share more acceptable. I think people are still a little uncertain about sharing a ride with other people. If we make it not seem as sketchy then I think the program would gain a lot more support. I feel the more we advertise and the less daunting we make the program, the more people will utilize the tool. I think carpooling and bus-riding isn't as much of an issue, but the same approaches should be applied.
--Winter
I was really happy to see everyone was so open to taking a survey randomly. Someone commented that the survey went by really fast, which it easy to gather information from a lot of people. I found that everyone I interviewed knew that the CCTA was free. Almost most people I interviewed did not know about rideshare and there was a minority in people that had used rideshare before. Many people thought it would be great if the CCTA buses ran more frequently on the weekends, which I also resonate with. Another good suggestion I heard was that there should be more schedules spread around about when the on-campus buses run because that is a bit up in the air. Also if the UVM website had a link to the CCTA bus website on it.
:Kizette:
One student, whom I found particularly interesting, told me that the UVM buses would be more effective if they followed an effective schedule, even if they were to run at a slower pace. This way, students could predict when the buses come and go, rather than waiting without knowing when it will come. He told me that weekday evening buses, which never fill up, might be more effective if they were replaced by vans, which could travel more quickly and save gas.
A small percentage of people i interviewed knew about rideshare. I think more publicity, and a streamlining of the website would make it much more effective.
Dan Hale
Overall, many of the people that I talked to had already formed their own carpools and such modes of consolidating travel to get home or to wherever, which was great to hear! In regards to the bus system, I heard from alot of people that they have had similar problems as I have in the past, which is the unreliabilty if the bus schedule, and the miserable waiting in the cold for the bus. I know there is not much that can be done about this problem, but I think this is a major contributer to the fact that many students choose to bring their cars to school.
Casey
I realize that many students feel like need to bring their cars to campus because it is their easiest way to get back home or to get to the grocery store. With just a small inconvenience, however, almost everyone can get by without having a car at school.
I think one way to increase bus-usage, public transportation growth and carpooling would be to challenge students to think critically about having their car on campus, how often they drive it, and what the alternatives are available to them.
It takes maybe ten to fifteen minutes to walk downtown, less to bike and take the bus, but yet some folks still insist upon using their cars. I am honestly surprised by the resistance that I receive sometimes when I want to go someplace on foot — as soon as the mode of transportation becomes more physical, less people are excited.
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