Most students at Northwestern probably believe that in general, they are safe on and around campus. Evanston had its lowest level of reported crime in 29 years in 2001. We feel like we are removed enough from the big city that we don’t have to worry about violent crimes.
But in October, an NU student was attacked on the Lakefill. On Sunday, a 21-year-old woman was shot and killed only blocks from campus.
And early Wednesday morning, another NU student was attacked while walking home alone. Near the intersection of Emerson Street and Maple Avenue, an unknown male grabbed her and tried to drag her away from the sidewalk. The incident ended there only because a police car happened to drive by; the perpetrator fled when the victim screamed.
We hope this crime will serve as a wake-up call to NU’s administrators. After the October assault and much student lobbying, they agreed to improve on-campus lighting this year. Lighting will do much to improve security on campus, but administrators need to ensure the safety of their students both on and off campus. And that means overhauling the shuttle service and expanding the Escort Service.
Right now, few students use NU’s main shuttle, the Purple Route. For starters, the service is poorly advertised. Most students, even those whose residences are served well by the service, don’t know where it stops. Moreover, they don’t know when it stops, since schedules are not posted everywhere. And even where times are posted, the buses often fail to follow the schedule, needlessly complicating matters for students who merely want a convenient and safe way to get home.
NU administrators should make a point to have the shuttle schedule easily accessible. Posting the schedule online, even with a global positioning system, only helps students who are sitting inside waiting for the shuttle to arrive. The schedule and route should be posted at each stop, as they were in the past, and drivers should be required to follow the time table. Every student should receive wallet-sized cards with shuttle information.
The shuttle’s route also must be revamped. Right now, a student who wants to go from the university library to the Fraternity Quad would be in for almost a half-hour trip. Even without adding another bus, the university could route the two existing buses in opposite directions, shaving time off the average student’s trip and encouraging students to take advantage of the underused service.
If the shuttle ran efficiently, it could also allow the overloaded Escort Service to focus on students who don’t live near a scheduled shuttle stop.
Though administrators did increase the service’s capacity Winter Quarter, it still often has wait times of an hour or more. At 1 a.m. and 1:30 a.m. Wednesday – about the same time the student was attacked – two Daily staffers happened to call the Escort Service from Norris University Center and were both told that the wait would be at least 60 minutes.
Though an extra car or two would not eliminate waiting, it certainly would help. If NU simply cannot find room in its budget to pay for an extra car alone, we’re sure students would be willing to chip in a few dollars in the interest of safety. After all, they did agree to pay about $120 a year for cable in the dorms.
In any case, we hope administrators and ASG will make these services a priority. What happened in October and this week should not happen again.
