New shuttle system offers safe transport for Brown, RISD faculty, staff, students

by Kristen Cole

Faculty and staff heading to cars after dark, graduate students leaving campus for their apartments and undergraduates loaded with books to return to the Science Library can now opt for an after-dark lift to their destination.

Brown University and the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) collaborated this year to provide shuttle service to faculty, staff and students, expanding the area and variety of routes covered by previous shuttle services.

Named safeRIDE, the safety-oriented transportation service began this month and will operate every 10 minutes from 5 p.m. to 3 a.m. each day throughout most of the academic year (The service starts at 7 p.m. during September, April and May, when it gets dark later.)

SafeRIDE offers options to get around Рboth on campus and off campus Рduring the evening: a shuttle operating on five scheduled routes, three around the Brown campus and two around the RISD campus; and a shuttle operating on a reservation basis, called onCall. (For route maps and schedules, go to the safeRIDE Web site.

"We hope it will serve as a model of transportation infrastructure that enables people to move around the city safely," said Abigail Rider, safeRIDE project director and director of Brown's real estate and administrative services.

The onCall service will take a Brown or RISD community member off campus within a specified area - one that stretches north to the Pawtucket line at the intersection of Hope Street and Blackstone Boulevard, south to Wickenden Street, and west to Dean Street. Riders may bring one unregistered guest with them if they notify the dispatcher when making the reservation.

The shuttle schedule also includes a daytime service called BrownMed Express to the downtown hospitals, and daytime service called DSS onCall for Brown community members with disabilities who need to get around campus. Those services operate weekday from about 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. for BrownMed Express, and 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. for DSS onCall.

The expanded service came about when a review of state law exposed a requirement that shuttle drivers be 21 or older and have a chauffeur's license. Brown and RISD joined to hire Road Island Red to provide the new service. The two institutions now hire student dispatchers but not student drivers.

Temporary signs currently indicating shuttle stops are expected to be replaced by permanent 18- by 24-inch red and black logos. To reserve a ride through onCall services after 5 p.m., call 863-1788.