One of the benefits of paying roughly $49,000 a year to go Quinnipiac University is a “free” shuttle service. These shuttles can be very useful at times, especially for students without cars on campus. But what good are they when they never show up and leave you stranded in the middle of New Haven?
My roommate Avani and I had taken a trip to New York City one recent Saturday. We had been up since 6 a.m. and walked around for twelve hours. The trip was going remarkably well, considering how long and tiring the day was, and the last thing on our to do list was to get on the 11:05 p.m. shuttle from Union Station back to campus.
The timing couldn’t have been more perfect. Our train got in at 10:55 p.m. and all we had to do was wait a few minutes for the shuttle to arrive. When the clock reached 11:15 p.m. we decided that the shuttle was just running a little late because of its routine run to pick up and drop off busloads of students in New Haven.
So, we continued to sit and wait. During our 45-minute wait, we saw three shuttles arrive. Each time we stood up and got our stuff together, only to sit right back down. The shuttles were from Yale.
By the time it was 11:45 p.m. we decided to get a cab with our new friend, Lenny, who was equally angry about the situation. The three of us got into a cab so that we could finally get back to campus.
When we got on the highway we were all in disbelief as we saw the Quinnipiac shuttle just a few cars ahead of us. I was speechless. How helpful is a service that skips over an entire stop on its route back to campus? So in addition to the $49,000 a year to come here, the three of us had to split the cost of a $35 cab ride. Yes, $12 per person is not a huge deal, but that is not the point.
The point is that the shuttle should have stopped at the train station like it was supposed to. The shuttle is not reliable if it just skips over stops where there are several students waiting for the scheduled transportation to arrive.
What would we have done if we had no money? What if our cell phones were dead? What would we have done then?
-Jessica Joline
