P-Rides service delivers on campus

Thomas Dollar '08 spends his Thursday and Friday nights behind the wheel of a white minivan. As a student driver for Public Safety's P-Rides Express, he transports students across campus to return to their dorms, to study in Firestone or to party on Prospect Avenue.

"A lot of crazy things can happen at P-Rides. If you park in front of TI or Cottage on a Thursday night, you become prey," Dollar said, describing nights when he receives a call to pick up students at the Street.

"People will just swarm into the van and overwhelm you. I always keep the doors locked," Dollar said.

The late-night P-Rides Express shuttle has provided students with safe, free intra-campus transportation at night for over 20 years, said associate director of operations for Public Safety Duncan Harrison.

But some students question whether the one-van service adequately supports the needs of undergraduate and graduate students who request rides. They said the University should rethink the mission and expand the size of P-Rides Express.

"Almost every night we do get swamped to the point we're backed up 30 minutes," student driver Juan Lopez '06 said. "Having two shuttles running would be nice."

Daria Koroleva '07 said another late-night van would help cut down on the long wait times she has experienced, especially as winter weather sets in.

During finals last January, she waited for an hour for P-Rides to drive her from Wallace Hall to Forbes, even though the call collector estimated a 20-minute wait.

"The problem is that a lot of grad students use it, and they get priority because they live so far away," Koroleva said.

P-Rides student manager Dev Chugh '06 disagreed. He said P-Rides usually only gets flooded with calls on nights when eating clubs host formals.

"It's unreasonable for us to change the whole system for one night," he said. He also said it would be hard to find more students to work on weekend nights.

"If the service is not adequate enough, and [students] voice that to us, we would sit down and have a conversation," Harrison said. Public Safety would then have a broader conversation with University administrators to discuss funding, he said.

P-Rides mission

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Harrison said safety continues to be the number one priority of the shuttle service, which runs from 5 p.m. to 2 a.m. daily.

"Campus is deserted, especially at night," Lopez said. Walking alone can be "intimidating because there are certain areas that are poorly lit," he said.

The second, broader purpose of P-Rides Express is to provide free transportation for all undergraduate and graduate students. The van picks up students from Princeton Junction after the Dinky service ends for the night or when the Dinky breaks down.

The shuttle also caters to the lazy. Dollar estimated that P-Rides receives half its calls from students who don't want to walk short distances.

This use of P-Rides can adversely affect its ability to serve other students.

"The quality of service we can offer [students] is decreased when people don't feel like walking in the rain to get to the Street," P-Rides student manager Brandon Ricaurte '06 said in an email.

Ricaurte questions whether P-Rides should refocus its services on students who are concerned about safety, have a physical disability, must travel long distances or have to carry luggage.

"The P-Rides shuttle is a valuable service for those people that actually are concerned about their safety and for graduate students that would otherwise have to walk for 30 minutes to get home," Ricaurte said.

Most graduate students live in one of six apartment complexes off campus. The farthest complex, the Millstone Apartments, is about four miles away from campus off Route 1.

During the day, P-Rides provides three free shuttle lines — Orange Line (Tiger Tram), Green Line and Blue Line — that serve undergraduates, graduate students, faculty and visitors. Harrison said one purpose of P-Rides is to cut down on vehicular traffic on campus.

Efficiency

In 2004, Public Safety downsized P-Rides Express from two 15-passenger vans that drove a circular route around campus to a single minivan that responds to specific student calls. Harrison said the minivan was selected from a risk management perspective because the larger vans are more likely to flip over.

Though the call-specific service allows P-Rides to respond to students quickly and pick them up from convenient locations, some student drivers believe the reduction of the van fleet has put stress on the program and created longer wait times.

"It's almost like the service has been cut down to a quarter size," Lopez said.

Additional training for call collectors and drivers could increase the program's efficiency, call collector Alison Prichard '08 said.

To request a ride, undergraduate and graduate students must phone the call collector, who then radios the van driver and gauges how long it will take to reach the request.

While call collectors must ask students their current location and destination, many don't ask how many are in the party, whether they have luggage or if they have an injury or physical disability, Prichard said.

Prichard also said it would be helpful if students gave the call collector their room extension or another number so they could be reached in case of delay.