A 100 percent increase in CATA student bus fares is bad for the university. With the already overcrowded parking situation, then the more people who are encouraged to take the bus, the less people will need to hunt for parking spots and be late for classes (or be driven in by friends).

It is bad enough CATA gives you no real break on a semester pass (if you ride two times per day, five days per week for the semester, it works out the same as paying the per ride student fare). At least though, at 25 cents, the bus fare is on par with a semester parking pass on campus.

If CATA raises the fare by 100 percent to 50 cents, the cost to ride the bus will be double what it costs to park on campus. What do you think that will do to the already bad campus traffic and parking situation? I strongly suggest the university spend some money to subsidize the 25-cent CATA student fares rather than allowing fares to rise and having an even worse campus parking problem, which puts more students in danger when crossing campus roads because of the increase in campus traffic.

This only addresses student fares; it does not even begin to address the unfairness of raising the fares for seniors or people with disabilities who don’t have the option of driving, and live on fixed incomes or must pay for their own care. They certainly should not have to pay more, if anything, to have access to public transportation.

This latter issue is something CATA needs to address, but certainly is something to which the university community should lend its support.

Karsten Shein
geography graduate student