The Transportation Services Advisory Committee (TSAC) decided Tuesday to postpone a decision to launch a bicycle registration program that would require bicyclists to pay a $10 fee to register to ride and park on campus.
“Transportation Services is still looking to go forward with some kind of bike program, but they are going to wait until implementing a program at this time until the get more student feedback,” said Logan Nichols, chairman for student services of the Student Senate, TSAC member and junior agricultural economics major.
The committee discussed ways to fund the program without implementing student user fees.
“TSAC understood concerns about charging students for the initial creation of a bicycle program and that alternative revenue sources should be utilized to fund the inception of the program,” said Hunter Bollman, student advocate for student services in the Student Government Association, TSAC member and a junior accounting and finance major.
The committee credit the quality of the student feedback received for the delay in implementing the registration program and the ensuing fees.
“[Bollman and Nichols] felt like right now there would be a lot of opposition to the fee and the whole committee agreed that something else needed to be done,” said Rod Weis, executive director of Transportation Services.
The decision to table the drafted proposal until further student feedback could be gathered was important to the overall process, Bollman said.
“I thought it was a great step on Transportation Service’s behalf to listen to the student body and decide to get more feedback from various student representative groups about this important campus-wide issue before making a final decision,” Bollman said.
Weis supports what he called a “real bike program,” which would entail providing bike lockers, more bike parking areas, bicycle lock rentals, ways to cut locks in case a user loses his or her keys and showers for on-campus bicyclists.
“But all of these things need resources and that has to come from somewhere,” he said.
Bicycle education, safety and awareness should also be incorporated into the program, Weis said, and alleviating bicycle congestion on campus is also a concern.
“There are a lot of complaints about bicyclists and pedestrians getting hurt, injured or even killed, and we agree that something needs to be done for their safety,” Weis said. “If you walk by the MSC Breezeway or Heldenfelds, you can see the problem.”
Though the committee members agree that a bicycle regulatory program is necessary on campus, Bollman and Nichols are intent on not using student user fees to fund the program without the support of the student body.
“In my opinion, I don’t think we will see a fee from students this year, and that’s what the students on the subcommittee are there for,” Weis said. “They said that students wouldn’t agree to the program.”