Purple on Campus Drive

No professors on our campus will accept "F" work. In fact, according to university policy, students receiving an "F" in a class receive no academic credit. Unfortunately, university President Dan Mote is failing transportation planning. Between classes, Campus Drive is at what planners describe as an "F" level of service: gridlock. And Mote's proposed solution - moving all vehicular traffic and the Purple Line to Stadium Drive - fails to maximize access, efficiency and safety on the campus.

Last week, the Maryland Transit Administration presented detailed data on exactly how many vehicles and pedestrians are on Campus Drive. What does that data tell us about what President Mote should do? What does an "A" solution look like? Let's take a look at the data.

MTA told us that during the day, 78 percent of the vehicles on Campus Drive are private automobiles, 11 percent are city and university buses and the remainder, delivery trucks and service vehicles. However, if we count people and not vehicles, we get quite different results. Assuming, on average, cars will have 1.5 passengers, Shuttle-UM buses will have 30 riders and other public buses 20 passengers each, we find a whopping 68 percent of all people traveling on Campus Drive are riding public transit - just 11 percent of the vehicles! Furthermore, the MTA found that some 17 percent of the cars were just passing through the campus.

MTA has proposed closing Campus Drive to private vehicles and reserving it for buses and trains only. Let's assume the 17 percent of cars just passing through the campus choose different routes and 10 percent of the remaining car commuters choose to ride buses or the Purple Line (which seems reasonable with housing being built nearby and huge increases in bus ridership as it is). The result is a net reduction of 1,391 vehicles from campus during the day on this road alone! Reducing the number of vehicles on the campus is something everyone can support and a goal supported clearly in the Facilities Master Plan.

President Mote has raised concerns about pedestrian safety on Campus Drive, a valid concern on any campus. Fortunately, MTA studied when, where and how many people were crossing the road. What they found was although the number is large - some 25,000 pedestrians - the vast majority cross during the 15-minute intervals between classes. Since the Purple Line is proposed to operate every six to 12 minutes, this would mean only two trains would pass through during all but one of these passing periods. The Transportation Research Board has noted that "Although [light rail] systems have excellent overall safety records, public perception often runs counter to the statistics."

President Mote's proposed Stadium Drive alignment has a number of important drawbacks.

First, on the issue of safety, his route actually means the trains will traverse our campus for a further distance, and in areas where pedestrians are less concentrated.

Second, this route is removed from the activity centers on the campus. Most Shuttle-UM buses depart from near the Stamp Student Union for a good reason: it's located at the center of the campus near large buildings people are going to, something contained in the Master Plan.

Third, the MTA engineers were very concerned about the impact of major sporting events on the stadium. President Mote's route would send trains immediately adjacent to Byrd Stadium, and planners feared the huge crowds of people would inevitably spill onto the road and clog traffic.

Lastly, routing everything to Stadium Drive won't solve the problem that buses, trains and cars will be competing for the same road. The beauty of the MTA proposal is that it helps us maximize access to the campus while still allowing the 68 percent of the people on Campus Drive riding buses to continue to access the center of the campus.

Modern light rail is fast, clean and efficient. It would help take thousands of cars off the campus and help thousands of students, faculty, staff and Terps fans access the campus more easily and efficiently. If it were built, I have no doubt the Purple Line would be an unobtrusive asset and a symbol of forward-thinking excellence.

Luckily, unlike with the location of the College Park Metro Station determined under a past president, there's still time for President Mote to re-write his proposal for full credit. Let's champion an "A" plan that maximizes access, efficiency and safety: the Purple Line on Campus Drive.

Rob Goodspeed is an urban planning graduate student and a co-editor of RethinkCollegePark.net. He can be reached at editors@rethinkcollegepark.net.