They've taken away my free bus pass!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

And, what’s worse, I’ve discovered that I’m a bus junkie! :eek:

Last year, my department chair was able to twist the dean’s arm and I got hired as an actual full-time professor, 12 contact hours, real salary, and, more importantly, benefits. Along such with trivial things as health insurance, my benefits package included a free bus pass which is not so much to Save Our Mother Earth (although this is a very green campus) as to encourage me not to take up a damn parking space all day.

The nice thing is that there are no strings attached. I can ride any bus in the system, any time, for free. I found it very convenient to use my free bus pass to commute to my “other” job on a campus where parking permits, even in the lots that are located in the Darkest Hinterlands, are ridiculously expensive. However, I also use my pass for the purpose for which it was intended; even though we have two cars and I could drive to work every day and park with my free parking permit, I take the bus, because it’s reasonably convenient and it saves gas. And Our Precious Mother Earth.

Now, bus passes are issued along with parking permits, and for whatever reason, faculty permits are valid from Jan 15-Jan 15. So, for the fall semester, even though I was busted back down to half-time, my bus pass still worked. I didn’t give it a second thought . . . until new parking permits were issued for Jan 15. And my parking permit envelope didn’t have a bus pass in it. Slowly I connected the dots. No longer benefits-eligible. No more bus pass.

NOOOOOOOOO!

I can’t believe how much this blows my mind.

At first I thought, oh, well. I still have my parking permit, so I can drive in to teach. But how about getting to the Other Campus? No prob, I think, I’ll ride in with my husband to his work, then take the bus from downtown up to — Damnit! Okay, okay, no problem, I can park with my permit and then to get over to the Other Campus I’ll just jump on Route 14 . . . No, wait, you can’t do that, because THAT IS A BUS, YOU MORON!

Okay, okay, okay, we can work things out . . . The hubby can drop me off and pick me up . . . That’ll annoy him, and I have to cope with his schedule, but it’s not the end of the world. I mean, I like getting in to work nice and early, while his job doesn’t start until 11 at the earliest, and I could certain work on things at home each morning, but . . .

Suddenly I realized that if I don’t ride the bus, when am I going to knit and listen to podcasts? See, I’m that weird lady you see on the bus, headphones on, needles clacking away, mumbling to herself occasionally, oblivious to the outside world, blissed-out expression on her face. I can’t read on the bus—it makes me miserably, miserably carsick—so I don’t feel guilty about not working. Even better, I don’t get carsick while knitting because I hardly have to look at my hands if my project is something simple, so I can do something I enjoy, which is actually, in some sense, productive. And while some of the podcasts I listen to a relatively pointless, many of them are educational and informative. By gum, it’s 40 minutes, morning and night, well spent!

And, damnit, they can’t just take that away from me!!!

So, I’m afraid I’m going to do the only thing I really can do. I’m going to buy a bus pass. Which is absolutely ridiculous, because, as I mentioned, we have two cars. My justification is that doubling our gas consumption, plus parking at the Other Campus would cost more than a bus pass. And, sure, I could carpool with the hubby, but it would really be terribly inconvenient for both of us, and why make both of us cross? And, hell, if that bus pass buys me two slices of stress-free happy-time a day, wouldn’t I be crazy not to grab on with both hands?

But I’m not dependent on the bus . . . No . . . I could quit any time . . . really!!!

[sub]I’m hopeless, aren’t I?[/sub]

2

Holds lighter up the the air

“Free Bus!”

Sorry Podkayne. Is there anyone full-time in the department that doesn’t use their pass, electing to drive instead, that might be available to “share” their pass with you?

3

Excellent suggestion, but I’m afraid they’re one step ahead of us. The bus pas is on the parking permit.

I do know of some husband-and-wife pairs who both work here, and drive in together, so they’d have a “spare” permit, but I don’t really feel that I know them well enough to ask if I can sponge one of their passes. Maybe I’ll do some undirected belly-aching and see if one of them makes the offer . . .

4

*Riding in the bus down the boulevard
And the place was pretty packed (yeah!)
Couldn’t find a seat so I had to stand
With the perverts in the back
It was smelling like a locker room
There was junk all over the floor
We’re already packed in like sardines
But we’re stopping to pick up more, look out

(chorus)
Another one rides the bus
Another one rides the bus
Another comes on and another comes on
Another one rides the bus
Hey, he’s gonna sit by you
Another one rides the bus*

5

For people who are not eligible for a bus pass benefit, does your school provide a subsidy? Where I work, they pay half, I pay half.

6

I’ve asked by email if they have any discount, or if I can get the student semester pass (which would be fairly decent; it’s about half the monthly-pass rate.) No word back, yet. I’m going to go to the transportation office if I haven’t heard anything by Monday.

7

It suddenly occurs to me that when I dress down, can pass as a student. (They sometimes interrogate me closely when I try to do professorial-type things.) Bus passes are sold at the campus store. If I were to walk up in jeans and a T-shirt while they’re being totally hammered with first-week-of-school textbook sales and ask for a semester bus pass, d’ya think they’ll ask to see my ID? evil grin

8

here’s hoping it all works out for you one way or another Podkayne!!

I’m a confirmed PTP (public transit person,) and have been so for years. Don’t even own no car, or have a valid driver’s license. Lately I’ve been paying full price for the Hamilton Street Railway monthly pass, (65 dollars canadian,) and using a burlington transit ‘combocard’, which is a sort of electronic cash-card dealie that you can transfer money to, and automatically deducts two bucks for each ride, even keeping track of your free transfer to another bus.

I commute from home in hamilton to work in burlington, so in the morning I can use my HSR pass and get a little paper transfer to use on the burlington buses… in the afternoon I use the combo card to get back to the hamilton bus.

Never really thought about being addicted to riding the bus before… but, well, given all the poor shmoes who are addicted to driving their cars, I’ll take this poison any day. :]
BTW, what do you use to listen to podcasts on? :smiley:

9

You got it baaaaad, chrisk. :slight_smile:

I listen to my podcasts on an iPod. (Stunningly original, eh?) It’s a venerable, battlescarred 10 Gig 3rd Gen. I hardly ever listen to actual music on it anymore. When it bites the dust, I’m strongly considering going with a Nano, which won’t hold my whole music collection, but could hold some selected playlists and the ~ 20 hours of podcasts I download per week.

10

I loooove public transit. I haven’t driven to work in years; I take a commuter train (diesel-on-tracks style, not an electric type) to downtown Chicago, then a bus to my workplace. I set up through a provider for my workplace to have my monthly train pass taken out of my paycheck pre-tax, which is nice. I’m a fellow knitting, blissed-out commuter, except I’m listening to music on a Rio brand MP3 player. In my case, my commute is almost certainly shorter on the train, and even if it might be longer, I love not having to deal with the driving.

11

I usually Ride the light rail to work here. I drive half way to a park-and-ride (park for free) and ride the remaining 10 minutes to downtown, then hoof it to work (hoof it? is that right? anyway…). When Denver’s new light rail lines open later this year, there will be a park-and-ride 5 miinutes from my house (10 by bike) which will be very convienent.

But when time is running short, I have a few places I can park downtown where the meter-maids don’t check often. I can park for free, but I risk a $20 ticket. So far, in almost a year of parking there about once a week, I only have one ticket, and that was when I came in to work early.

I almost wish my light rail trip was a bit longer. I just got one of these but i can only listen to 3 or 4 songs by the time i arrive at work.

12

I remember this song from when I lived in Boulder…riding the bus every day. It was the best transportation evah. I miss it!!

13

For the most part, I’m much happier with Tampa than I was with Balt/DC, but one thing I do miss is convenient and useful public transportation. I took the light rail to school for 2 years, and made much use of DC’s subway system. Tampa has busses, but they don’t come close to being practical for me to use.

14

UPDATE!

I have, right now, in my hot little hand, a free bus pas.

See, Monday morning, bright ‘n’ early, I went to the Office of Parking Tickets, and asked if I could somehow wangle a free pass or a discounted pass. They told me they couldn’t give me anything, 'cause I’m not benefits-eligible, but in the past, HR has made exceptions for “special cases.”

So I went to HR, and asked. (Some day I’ll get out of this “student” frame of mind and remember that I’m faculty, now, and faculty don’t go places, they make calls, but I dunno, it seems like sometimes things get done faster if you’re standing there tapping your foot.) The work-study at the desk ran around in the little warren of offices, and came back and told me I had to go to the Office of Parking Tickets. I told them I just came from there, and she said, oh, and disappeared into the warren again. When she returned, she asked if I had a car. I said yes, but that for many reasons the bus pass is much, much more convenient. She told me that a bus pass had to be approved by the director of HR, who was in a meeting. She took my name and number on a postit and told me she’d have her call me.

So I went back to my office and waited until the end of the day. No call. Grrrr. The next day I wasn’t going to be on campus, but I thought, surely, there’d be a message on my voicemail Wednesday morning.

No.

So I called the director of HR’s number. (See? Learning.) The work-study who answered had no idea who I was, but a message was to be conveyed that I was calling back regarding my bus pass, and had been waiting for a reply since Monday. Based on the timestamp on the voicemail, the director called back approximately 12.32 seconds after I walked out to go to my first class. She said she had gotten a message about me and my bus pass, but had no details, and asked me to call her back or email her.

I tried to call back: Work-study. Director: Not in office.

So I emailed her. I wasn’t really sure what the threshold level of need was for getting a pass. Did they usually do this for people missing one leg above the knee and living on foodstamps? Would it be enough to tell her that, garsh, I really wish I could have a bus pass? So I gave her a brief and largely unexaggerated tale of woe about having only one reliable car, my husband working two jobs, and the general suctackularness that is the involuntary transition from benefits-eligible to half-time. (I, of course, omitted any mention of the Other Campus.) I said that even if she could arrange for me to get a bus pass at the student rate, this would be a tremendous help to me.

She emailed back within an hour to say that she would be happy authorize a free pass for me, and would contact the Office of Parking Tickets right away. I should call them before I went down to pick up my pass to be sure that they would have it ready. This was at 3:30. The OPT closes at 4:30. I called the OPT. They told me they had not heard from her, but give it a half hour. I called back at 4:00. They told me they had not heard from her, but it was likely that she had emailed the Boss of Parking Tickets, not the general whining-about-parking-tickets@ourschool.edu account, and the Boss was out of the office for the rest of the day.

So.

I called this morning at 9 AM. They had the email. I cajoled my husband into driving me to campus, and, HA HA! I have my bus pass.

See how easy that was? :smiley: