For over 10 years, the 475-RIDE program has given countless rides, protecting students from potentially dangerous situations. When Molly Schmitz and Brett Stohs co-founded the program, they were excited by the opportunity to provide a lasting service that could ensure the safety of University of Nebraska-Lincoln students. The service was developed not only in response to the tragic death of Laura Cockson, who was killed by a drunk driver, but also to keep all students who were in potentially dangerous situations safe.
Today, ASUN believes that 475-RIDE is still incredibly valuable to us as students and is fighting to keep it alive. This, however, has become increasingly difficult as the past year has seen the service increasingly used beyond its original purpose. With each of us contributing only $1.12 through our student fees every year to keep this service running, it cannot be used for anything other than a last resort. As an example, if you use the service just once during your entire college career, and that ride costs $15 (an average ride cost), then you have spent more than three times what you've paid over the entire four-year period.
We realize that there may be a lot of misinformation out there about 475-RIDE. Here are the facts: It is not meant to be a ride you plan to use after every Thursday night class or after a night at the bars, and it is definitely not supposed to take you anywhere other than your university-registered home address. At no time should you leave your home planning to use 475-RIDE. Instead, it should be a service that you rely on when all other planned options fail. Instead of using 475-RIDE, you should explore other options such as planning to ride with a friend, using the bus system, walking or paying for your own cab. In order for ASUN to ensure that this program is available for you when you truly need it, you must each take responsibility for your own day-to-day transportation needs. If you don't, ASUN will be forced to stop funding this service for you.
With that said, we understand that there may be a lot of concern about transportation issues on campus. To help campus better address these issues, we are holding a town hall meeting on Nov. 18 in the City Union Auditorium. We hope this event will allow each of you to communicate your situations, your needs and your concerns so that if there is a solution available, we can help.
Brian Coburn
ASUN Internal Vice President
coburn.brian@gmail.com
is a member of the 
6 comments
With that said, we definitely feel that there are transportation needs that aren't being met and should be addressed campus wide. The issue will be whether or not the need is widespread enough to justify an increase in service, which will of course have to be coupled with an increase in fees.I encourage anyone who feels that their needs aren't being met to come to the town hall on Nov. 18 at 7pm in the city union.
Thank you for your comment. We have addressed this concern and have guidelines to notify those individuals who we think are abusing the service. We realize that we've always had that power, but our first goal is to ensure the safety of students who find themselves in dangerous situations that they were unable to plan for. We couldn't address those students who were using it beyond this purpose until recently and we now are using guidelines to help us determine whether or not someone is misusing the service. We are avoiding a limit of use to the service because we want to avoid arbitrarily setting limits on such a valuable service.Thank you for your input and please know that we have ways of doing this such that we aren't being quite so arbitrary.