As clouds grew dark in the sky and the wind stirred up an uncomfortable chill, students shivered and clutched their books tightly hoping it wouldn't start to rain. All they wanted at that moment was for the bus to show up and drive them home.
The UB Stampede, which has been transporting students since 2005, has recently not been running according to its schedule.
"One day it's good to go, but then it's inconsistent because you've got eight busses in a row going to Ellicott but then you have to wait 30 or 40 minutes for a bus to take you to South Campus," said Bill Bixby, a junior linguistics major. "This is something that has to be on time. I've tried to talk to bus drivers, but they are always just like, ‘I don't know I just work here.' It's frustrating."
Bixby once stood at Lee Loop for 20 minutes waiting to catch a bus to South Campus. From there, he needed to take the subway and catch a tightly scheduled bus to East Amherst where he works in order to pay for his college tuition. He ended up being late.
Punctuality is especially important to Bixby because he's a shuttle bus driver himself.
"I see [that the UB Stampede] is all poor organization and not planning," Bixby said. "I don't think [the supervisors] take into consideration people taking off or busses breaking down. I understand there might be traffic or special circumstances, but this is so inconsistent it's ridiculous."
Bixby was not alone in his complaints. Standing with him were 13 other students waiting just as anxiously for a bus.
"I've been waiting here for a while," said Tara Jamali, a junior communication major. "I'm going to be late for class. Luckily this teacher is OK with it, but in other classes I could get in a lot of trouble [for being late]."
It's not just class that students are missing out on because of the unreliable bus schedule. On the weekends, the bus seems to appear less frequently, according to Kyle Jiron, a freshman biomedical sciences major. Students rely on the bus to get them to events around campus.
Jiron once waited 45 minutes at the Governors bus stop for a ride to Ellicott for an intramural soccer game. He and his teammates had to forfeit because they arrived so late.
"Everybody was upset...nobody wanted to admit defeat," Jiron said. "We couldn't understand why the bus drivers just couldn't come to pick us up."
UB Stampede drivers are the first to feel the wrath of students upset at the bussing system. But most drivers just do what they're told by their supervisors and are not permitted to change the schedule, according to Mike Girdlestone, a UB Stampede driver.
Officials in the Department of Parking and Transportation Services create daily schedules for drivers during peak times, 7:45 a.m. to 5:30 p.m., and off peak times 5:30 p.m. to 7:45 a.m. The busses are scheduled to run every 3 to 4 minutes during peak time and every 10 to 15 minutes during off peak time.
Like Bixby suspected, the reason why the schedule hasn't been running correctly is due to a lack of planning. The drivers take breaks during the day and the bus company, First Transit Inc., is not providing enough drivers to cover those shifts, according to Chris Austin, the assistant director of Parking and Transportation Services.
Because of the scheduling problems and the number of complaints received from students, the UB Stampede schedule has finally made some changes.
Since Monday, Nov. 7, four out of the 20 busses that run during the day have been redistributed. Three are now used to bring students from North Campus to South Campus rather than just North Campus alone, and one is used to transport students solely around South Campus.
"We got a lot of passenger comments and complaints about the schedule, which is why we made the modifications," Austin said. "Approaching the winter months, we don't want students to have to wait longer than necessary. Waiting for 10 minutes when its 70 degrees outside is a lot different than waiting for 10 [minutes] when it's 15 to 20 degrees."
Although efforts have been made to ease bussing anxieties, students aren't yet satisfied.
With another Buffalo winter quickly approaching, students fear that they will be forced to spend an extended amount of time waiting in the cold at the bus stop.
If the new modifications are not working, Austin encourages students to tell the Department of Parking and Transportation Services either by phone or via email.
"Many students don't report what is bothering them and then nothing gets fixed," Austin said. "I would hope [that] anyone who has a complaint [would] reach out and tell us…Students are our eyes and ears and are the passengers who we want to service. We hope to always be up to their expectations."
Email: features@ubspectrum.com
Photo: Courtesy of Wendy Smiley
Photo: Courtesy of Wikimedia Commons
