The Shuttle-UM bus stop in front of College Park Towers is no longer being serviced after Terrapin Row did not respond to a partnership offer made by the Department of Transportation Services, director David Allen said.
DOTS currently has partnerships with seven or eight local apartment complexes such as the View, Varsity and Enclave, he said. The apartments pay DOTS to bring the bus service onto their property and pick up their tenants.
“We offered the same thing for the same price [to Terrapin Row],” Allen said. “In order to be fair to those who make this contribution, those who don’t, we don’t serve.”
The stop previously existed for students on the campus who lived in South Campus Commons, and before Terrapin Row opened, it didn’t matter that people who lived in College Park Towers used the stop because there weren’t enough people living in those apartments to make the buses overcrowded, Allen said. But Terrapin Row brought an additional 1,432 residents into the picture, according to data provided by a leasing consultant.
“With 1,400 new people in Terrapin Row, they would have just crushed that route, and those who we were hoping would use it would never even have an opportunity to use it,” Allen said.
There will still be a stop that lets students off at the College Park Shopping Center, which is a little further down on Knox Road.
Junior community health major Mary Elizabeth Lees tweeted at Shuttle-UM on Monday after the Blue Line bus she was on didn’t stop at College Park Towers stop as she’d expected. For Lees, not having a stop is an added inconvenience for getting around.
“Most of my classes are in the public health building, so already it’s a really far walk,” Lees said. “That’s why I was hoping for a bus stop this year.”
For junior economics major Josie Kidwell, the lack of a bus stop near her apartment in Terrapin Row doesn’t affect her too much. She said the Green Line has two other bus stops that are each about a five-minute walk away.
“I do think it’s inconvenient if you’re going anywhere on North Campus, but if you’re only going on South Campus, that’s not really that big of a deal,” she said.
“It is kind of hard to get to the gym or to Stamp, but going to Route 1, you wouldn’t even want to take the bus anyway,” she said.
Although Terrapin Row chose not to respond to Shuttle-UM’s business inquiry, Allen said if the apartment’s management changes its mind, the bus service could start at almost any time.
It’s now up to the students living in Terrapin Row to reach out to the management if having a bus stop is something that is important to them, Allen said.
