November 5, 2014

City of Columbia officials tweaked COMO Connect’s bus routes and schedules Monday in an effort to make transportation more timely and efficient.

“We have had lots of feedback since the new schedules started,” Columbia Public Works spokeswoman Teresa White said. “We’ll still have the same basic bus routes, but some neighborhoods are getting tweaks.”

Since COMO Connect rolled out routes and schedules in August, it has received mixed reviews.

“I think they should have tested the routes better beforehand,” junior Russell Levine said. “They were unrealistic about the amount of time it would take the bus to get from one stop to another, so they’re always late.”

Delays may be inevitable in any public transportation, White said.

“With any transportation on the road, delays are possible, and they do happen,” she said. “We have seen quite a bit of that in the center of town and on campus, where traffic backs up.”

The schedules have been revised to try and provide more accurate times. White also said each bus is equipped with a GPS tracker, so riders can watch their bus’ progress on a mobile app, DoubleMap.

“The app is outstanding,” Levine said. “The app isn’t the problem. I can see the bus coming in real time. The problem is that it’s 10 minutes late.”

COMO Connect is adding a stop near Gentry Middle School to serve the Bethel neighborhood along the No. 7 Dark Green route. White said the stop was added due to feedback from the neighborhood.

“It’s important for any healthy community to have a good public transportation system,” White said.

Much of students’ dissatisfaction with available transportation seems to stem from an ordinance that shifted private shuttle pickup to Hitt Street outside of Memorial Union and Tiger Avenue west of Strickland Hall. Ordinance 21390 Section 14-180, [which the city began enforcing this fall, mandates only city buses can make stops in front of MU’s Student Center.](http://www.themaneater.com/stories/2014/9/10/ordinance-prohibits-private-campus-shuttles-certai/) Previously, both city buses and student housing shuttles made stops outside the Student Center.

In a [Sept. 10 Maneater article](http://www.themaneater.com/stories/2014/9/10/ordinance-prohibits-private-campus-shuttles-certai/), MU Parking and Transportation Services Director Mike Sokoff said the ordinance was made to benefit students.

“The change was made to facilitate better movement and reduce (traffic) congestion, to make it safer and more available, and that was the goal to begin with: to get students to school and get them to class as safely as possible,” Sokoff said.

In October, MSA protested the enforcement of the ordinance and issued a formal objection. The resolution, written by MU seniors Chad Phillips and Benjamin Bolin, stated that as a result of the enforcement, students were displaced from a climate-controlled, safe environment inside the Student Center. It also stated that the change presents a hazard to pedestrians and vehicles while they wait outside Memorial Union, and Hitt Street is too narrow to safely accommodate the shuttles.

No change to the ordinance has yet been proposed.

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