IRVINE : UCI Shuttle Gets an ‘A’ for Service

Business is booming these days on the campus of UC Irvine for a student-operated shuttle bus service that recently was named winner of the Governor’s Transportation Award.

Honored for helping to alleviate campus parking problems, the program has proven itself as a penny-wise alternative to building new parking garages, officials say.

The Associated Students of UCI operates the Blue Line, the Blue Line Plus and the Gold Line shuttles in serving residents of Newport Peninsula, Balboa and the Park West apartment complexes in Irvine that house students.

“I think it’s really valuable, because the parking is so expensive here, and sometimes it’s hard to find parking at certain times of the day,” said Heather Dishaw, a senior social ecology major.

Dishaw, who owns a car, started riding the shuttle this year and is impressed with the way the program is operated.

“They’re very reliable,” she said. The shuttles run every 20 minutes between UCI and Park West Apartments.

“They come when they say they will, and it’s the best deal around if you’re going to be living around here,” Dishaw said.

The fee is 50 cents per ride, or 34 cents if a students buys a shuttle pass.

“We all have cars, it’s just easier” to take the shuttle, said Katie Austin, a sophomore English major who has been a shuttle rider since her freshman year.

“There are more students (who ride now) than there were last year,” Austin said.

“I think it’s very progressive of UCI to be doing it, and its very good for the student-school relationship to know that they’re thinking about us,” Dishaw said.

The shuttle program, which is co-sponsored by the UCI Parking and Transportation Department, began in the spring quarter of the 1986-87 school year.

“It was done at the urging of the students,” said Dennis Hampton, Associated Students executive director.

Two students--one of them Jim Caras, student body president during the 1985-86 school year--wrote a research paper on the cost-effectiveness of a parking garage versus a shuttle, Hampton said. The study concluded that a shuttle would be “cheaper, even over a long period of time.”

The program, which carries about 2,500 riders per month and employs 17 divers who are also students, steadily grew from one 21-passenger shuttle serving both Park West and Balboa. It now also includes two 15-passenger vans. It’s so popular with students that ridership on the Blue Line Plus, for example, has doubled since last year’s spring quarter.

“It’s an excellent program and it’s a great idea . . . because the students need a way to get to school, and there are some (parking) problems,” said shuttle driver Dina Lish, a senior political science/economics major.

“It’s by far, probably, the most popular program” of the Associated Students, said Tim Rudeck, lead driver and supervisor of the program. “It gets the most student response.

“I think we’ve really responded to the student needs.”

Rudeck, who graduated with a degree in social sciences from UCI in June, said the program’s officials hope to obtain new buses at the beginning of next year or perhaps at the end of this school year. With an operating budget of about $106,000, the program leases the shuttles from Fleet Services.

Because the shuttles cost about $50,000 to buy, the program is looking for a corporate sponsor. Taco Bell helped with contributions last year.