Once his class ended last Friday at 7 p.m., Jeremy Fontaine, a student at the University of Massachusetts, waited for a bus that never came.
Fontaine, who lives in North Amherst, was waiting on campus for the Pioneer Valley Transportation Authority buses that run north on North Pleasant Street, specifically the 31 and the 30 routes.
Though he remembered seeing fliers earlier in the week regarding changes to the PVTA bus schedule, Fontaine said he assumed any changes were related to the construction near Hasbrouck Laboratory, and disregarded the information.
“It’s a good 15 to 20 minutes’ walk to my house which is not too bad,” said Fontaine, adding, “but after being on campus from 9 a.m. to 7 p.m., the last thing I want to do is walk.”
UMass Transit Operations Manager Glenn Barrington said bus lines were running, though some routes were “detoured.”
Such routes will also be changed this weekend.
According to a tweet posted on UMass Transit’s Twitter page, “From 6PM Fri 4/27 to Sun morning 4/29, Route 31 won’t service stops between UMass & N Amherst Ctr. Catch buses @ GRC or Townehouse Apt #PVTA.”
Route 31, the route that runs from the Boulder Apartments in South Amherst, to the center of Sunderland, will not stop along North Pleasant Street after stopping at the Arnold House on campus, near the rotary. The bus will not stop just past the rotary, across from the Puffton Village Apartments, nor in the center of North Amherst, near the intersection of Meadow Street and North Pleasant Street.
Barrington said such changes to the route were made at the request of the Amherst Police Department and the Puffton Village Apartments.
He added that such changes in the routes were made in hopes of cutting down on parties during the weekend at off campus housing in North Amherst.
To thwart rowdy parties traditionally held at the end of the year, Amherst Police Department has increased officers on duty.
“The entire department has been ordered to work,” said Capt. Christopher Pronovost, in an interview with The Republican last week, meaning 43 officers will be on duty.
Notorious parties such as the “Hobart Hoedown” have drawn more than 1,000 attendees to the North Amherst apartment complexes in recent years. Last year, officers closed the roads near Puffton Village Apartments and Hobart Lane to deter partygoers.
Last weekend, two dozen people were issued alcohol related citations.
Barrington added that students who have had too much to drink have also caused destruction to UMass Transit Services property. According to Barrington, students have caused approximately $25,000 in property damage through the destruction of five bus shelters.
Although some may think cutting off particular bus stops may decrease off-campus partying, others believe the students are going to drink regardless.
Newly appointed Student Government Association President Akshay Kapoor has been working with PVTA to provide a “Sober Shuttle” program for students expected to be in full swing by the fall semester.
Through a $1.29 increase to student activity fees, Kapoor said he has come up with a program to transport students from bars or other off-campus hot spots, and back to their homes safely. According to Kapoor, the fee could help prevent students driving drunk.
Additionally, Kapoor said the sober shuttle will help prevent overcrowding on the bus.
“This is one of those areas where we don’t want to be turning anyone away,” he said. “If this is someone’s last resort to get home safely, I think it’s pretty unfair to see a problem and not recognize it.”
He added, “so this is a really easy cost effective program for students, and I think it’s something that can help SGA branch out more.”
Regarding the current bus detours, Kapoor finds this to be a two-fold solution. He acknowledges that in the past students have ripped off bus doors and harassed student bus drivers, but in hopes to protect their operations, students are being affected negatively.
“One of the biggest things for me is not only the drunk driving impact, but the transportation part. I mean I had to give my buddy a ride home that would usually take the bus off campus on Friday,” said Kapoor.
According to Kapoor, there is always a balance in every decision made by both PVTA and UMass Transit services.
“There’s no perfect solution right now, and I wish there was but
we’ll see,” he said.
Brittney Figueira can be reached at [email protected].
Rowan • Jun 26, 2012 at 11:00 pm
To: Ed Cutting
Just went searching the net for bus shelters and they do go for around $5,000 and up hell shopping carts can cost $700 apiece, out door trashcans can cost over $800 these things aren’t cheap.
Ralph Kramden • May 1, 2012 at 9:09 pm
I used to be a UMass Transit student bus driver. A few comments:
[1] Usually in cases like this, it’s not UMass Transit, but the police that dictate when a section of road will be closed to buses. Obviously no one wants an increase in drunk driving, but the police must weigh reducing bus service against sending buses through a sea of drunk college kids.
[2] I doubt anyone at UMass Transit cares whether or not a detour will deter partying. Notice that there wasn’t a direct quote supporting the sensational title “PVTA hopes route detours will deter partying”. It wouldn’t be the first time the Collegian misquoted someone, took something out of context, or applied a misleading title to a story.
[3] UMass Transit bus drivers have not just been harassed but have also been assaulted by drunk students.
Safety for passengers and pedestrians was always the primary concern when I was a driver. Unfortunately, that sometimes meant curtailing service, which is something no Transit company wants to do. But a service interruption is preferable to unsafe service.
Wanko • Apr 30, 2012 at 11:35 pm
This whole issue is a sh*tshow and I am not happy about it. We are college kids and we have the right to rage. I have no problem with UMass trying to clean up their image, but people, even thousands of people drinking in a quad doesn’t do damage. The police showing up in full riot gear is the problem. If they want us to riot and have to fight to party then I guess we will.
Ed Cutting • Apr 29, 2012 at 11:02 am
“…students have caused approximately $25,000 in property damage through the destruction of five bus shelters.”
This goes right back to my initial gut feeling. Imagine the response should the PVTA announce that they were discontinuing service to minority neighborhoods in Springfield or Holyoke because there had been some property damage to bus shelters down there — and then imagine the outcry if they threw in an allegation that it was minority persons who had done it.
There are three logical fallacies here. First, prove that the people who destroyed the bus shelters were even UMass students. Does anyone have any comprehension of how much the Amherst High School students do and is blamed on UM kids?
Second, prove that the persons destroying the shelters are actually the same persons who actually use the bus. Logic would be that they aren’t, drunk/sober/confused, human nature is NOT to destroy that which one finds to be of personal use/benefit.
Third, this is “group punishment” — punish an entire group of people for what a few individuals have done. It is the exact same thing as the PVTA discontinuing all service through Black neighborhoods because of the criminal activities of a few individuals who happen to be Black.
Exactly how do you *DO* $5,000.00 damage to a bus shelter? What are they — gold plated or something?!?!?! I am not justifying the destruction of them, but someone is making some bad management decisions and spending WAY too much money ON them. And these were all destroyed this year? Have any of us seen any evidence of this happening, like seen them all destroyed one Sunday morning?
Oh, Mr. Auditor — you might want to look into that $25,000.00 they are claiming to have spent on 5 new bus shelters this year because they might not really exist. It’s happened before, the Springfield Housing Authority comes to mind.
Lets get real here folks — A long-defunct trolley company, that went bankrupt during the First Great Depression of the 1930s, built a brick & wood shelter on North Pleasant Street which is still perfectly functional a century later. There are a couple other wooden shelters — one by Southwest/Sunset Ave and another by the FAC — that date from the 1980s if not 1970s. These haven’t been destroyed, have they?
OK, so if you have one kind of shelter which keeps getting destroyed (and isn’t big enough to shelter everyone waiting at the stop anyway) and you have another kind which is actually cheaper and which has survived 50-100 years, which would the competent administrator decide to build more of?
And the PVTA — the same folk who have been wasting money on various schemes to re-open the Springfield Union Station over the past 30 years — keep building the ones that keep getting destroyed. Good move folks….
Back when the student governments voted the allocation to the PVTA each year, the PVTA was responsive to student concerns. Maybe it is time for that to return…
Al • Apr 29, 2012 at 10:46 am
“waaaa we want to get drunk and the university should provide free transportation waaaaaaa!!!”
Josh • Apr 27, 2012 at 6:00 pm
“Barrington added that students who have had too much to drink have also caused destruction to UMass Transit Services property. According to Barrington, students have caused approximately $25,000 in property damage through the destruction of five bus shelters.”
Wow, with precedent like that, I can’t for the life of me imagine why the PVTA is reluctant to provide service to drunken students. And all this time I thought enterprises like the PVTA WANTED to piss away resources on destructive ingrates.
Ed Cutting • Apr 27, 2012 at 3:44 pm
One other thing — when was the required Public Hearing on this held? If they have to have one on other route changes, then why not on this one?
Acacia • Apr 27, 2012 at 2:55 pm
So they are working to provide a Sober Shuttle which is great…but they aren’t this weekend…so what exactly are they going to do to help students get to and from campus safely? This seems like one of the most counterproductive things that administration has done this year.
Mike • Apr 27, 2012 at 1:49 pm
This is ridiculous. Way to encourage drunk driving.
Mike
alum • Apr 27, 2012 at 12:39 pm
Ummmmmmmmmmmm…I thought part of the idea of PVTA was to provide a safe means of transport that takes some potential drunk drivers off the road.
Ed Cutting • Apr 27, 2012 at 8:50 am
Can anyone imagine what would happen if the PVTA were to eliminate service to parts of Holyoke or Springfield because of a perception that there might be criminals there?
How is this different?
And I think this just goes to show why I call it the Potentially Viable Transportation Alternative — we hear all the garbage about how reliable the service is and then they pull stunts like this. First, where is their environmental impact statement — yes guys, the Mass DEP requires one. And second, if it isn’t necessary to provide this service, then why are we paying for these buses in the first place?
And does anyone wonder why only 2.1% of the alumni were willing to pay dues to the alumni association (before they gave up on even trying to collect dues) — I can’t imagine why….
But back to my initial question. There are incidents in Springfield and Holyoke too — but the PVTA does not go from there to saying that all African Americans are criminals and eliminate the bus stops in their neighborhoods — how, exactly, is this different????
Seriously? • Apr 27, 2012 at 8:06 am
So there idea to keep parties under control is to limit the amount of busses???? that is seriously SO messed up.
Nick • Apr 27, 2012 at 6:22 am
I don’t see how this is going to cut down on partying. If people want to go out, they will find other ways, and I really worry about seeing a big spike in drunk driving because of this. Cutting off public transportation is not the way to fix the image of this campus.
rf • Apr 27, 2012 at 3:45 am
This is ridiculous. How many times does it need to be proved that working with students will yield tenfold results compared to fighting them? This is a college, students are going to party, and to think they can stop it is naive and downright irresponsible. I don’t know anyone who’s looking to go out that would give up because the buses aren’t stopping. I do, however, know people that wouldn’t hesitate to drive.