// Illustration by Cody Clark By Emily Erskine While I am thrilled that Western offers alternative options to driving, I remain deeply unsatisfied with my morning commute to school. Every day I arrive at my bus stop early, yet every morning bus after bus passes me, packed full of other students. I stand in the rain, miserable, tired and almost out of options. If you’re going to offer a bus service and charge a transportation fee to all students, then give all students access to busing. I get it, buses reach a certain capacity. There is only so much sardine-like shoving we can all do to fit on the hot, sweaty, stinky, germ-infested bus. But my god, if every bus is full in the morning, provide more buses. Every morning is a gamble. Will I or won’t I make it on the bus this time? Some mornings, I manage to escape inconvenience and cram in, but even on those glorious days, the bus zooms past other stops with students who didn’t make the cut. On the bad mornings, the mornings I dread, every bus drives past me and I must make the decision of whether I should take the L and walk the 17 minutes all uphill and be late to class anyways, or if I should wait around another 15 minutes for the next bus in hopes of fitting on and still be late. Sometimes I just go back to bed. This really would be less of an issue if driving to campus wasn’t so impossible. But not only are passes scarce and spots few, but if you are one of the lucky ones to score a pass, it is not cheap. An annual parking pass is approximately $300, and that does not even guarantee you a spot. Not to mention, parking tickets are given out like candy on Halloween. According to reporting done by The Western Front last spring, Western made $585,490 on parking tickets in 2018. If we can’t park on campus, and walking is too far, we should at least have access to enough buses. I really don’t think that’s too much to ask.
