Walking on campus ludicrous
I’ve had enough of the walking. I am just sick and tired of it. We Bruins walk everywhere. Our campus, pretty as it may be, is sprawling and expansive. A conservative estimate is that, in total, I have walked for approximately 100 trillion hours at UCLA this year alone.
That is the equivalent of traversing the Himalayas, climbing Mt. Everest and hiking the Sierra Nevadas, combined, thrice. And as someone who was until recently iPod-deficient, I can attest that walking was practically a living hell.
Indeed, time spent strolling around campus does add up quickly. Just think about the path to and from class a few times a day – Public Policy to Rieber, Powell to Macgowan, Bunche to Bruin Walk.
We have wasted much of our college lives mindlessly walking.
Currently, our system of buses and vans operate at inconvenient times to even more inconvenient places.
We deserve better.
Transport services are hardly advertised, and thus remain unknown to the vast majority of students.
In order to stay at the forefront of collegiate innovation we must begin to think outside the box. UCLA has the potential to be the envy of all other universities if only it will implement a few novel transportation ideas to ease the students’ burdens.
Certainly, I am not alone in this fight. At least one political party at UCLA is taking our transportation crisis seriously. The recently formed Bruin Liberation Movement has recognized UCLA’s glaring deficiencies and proposes unique solutions.
They have supported an idea which I proposed some time ago – a ski lift from the dorms to campus. In order to ride the ski lift, however, one must be fully clad in ski wear. While some will undoubtedly see this campaign platform as merely a joke, I urge UCLA not to prematurely discount the brilliant potential at hand.
A zip line could work well too. The morning trek from Hedrick to Bunche would instantaneously be transformed into a few seconds of unrivaled exhilaration.
Regarding the ski lift proposal, the leader of the BLM, known only as the “Grand Dragoon,” said, “It has been over 50 years since man supposedly stepped on to the moon. To think that we are still walking from point A to point B is absolutely ludicrous.”
The specific advance which is chosen to replace our antiquated and inadequate transport system is not what is of prime importance today.
Rather, we must begin the dialogue that will transform UCLA from just another fine university into the modern campus-transport capital of the world.
There are many savvy solutions to our present-day quandary. An airport-like movable track could be built throughout campus. A mini go-cart track could ring UCLA with one lane for normal use and a second carpool lane to encourage energy conservation. Wheeling students around on Indian-style rickshaws might become an optional part of the work-study program as well.
Who would truly choose “Janss Steps” over “Janss Escalators”?
Money will certainly become an issue, as more and more grandiose plans are proposed.
Yet as the Grand Dragoon of the BLM remarks, “If (UCLA) can pay $90,000 for a new school logo, surely they can dip into that slush fund for another few ‘Gs’.”
Indeed, UCLA, like any bureaucratic organization, wastes a great deal of money. Each year over $2.4 million is funneled into the largely ineffectual Campus Express. Many a time I’ve stood at a pickup spot, only to get fed up after waiting an inordinate amount of time. I have promptly left and cursed my bipedality.
Funding a taut zip line, sleek go-cart track, functional ski lift or multitude of rickshaws would far and away be a better use of our money.
Enough cash has been callously cast aside on the hallowed grounds of our beloved campus.
So suit up, UCLA. Strap on your skis and I’ll catch you on the lift to Bunche.
Keyes is a third-year Middle Eastern studies student. E-mail him at dkeyes@media.ucla.edu. Send general comments to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.
advertise
contact us
top of page