10 THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
NEWS
WEDNESDAY, JUNE 21, 2006
TRANSPORTATION
Buses slated for improvements
Study addresses cleanliness, pollution, accessibility and routing complaints
BY TOM SLAUGHTER
tslaughter@kansan.com
KANSAN STAFF WRITER
Working with the city of Lawrence, the University of Kansas has hired a consulting firm to analyze and improve the city's two major bus outlets, KU on Wheels and the Lawrence Transit System.
Daniel K. Boyle, president of Dan Boyle & Associates, hosted the first of five public meetings at City Hall and a meeting at the Kansas Union last week to get a feel for how both the city and those affiliated with the University - students and faculty felt the two systems could be improved.
After the study is completed, the project will go through two phases, Boyle said at the meetings. The first
will be the "standard transit project," intended to make the overall transit situation in the city better. The second phase will see if it would be possible to intertwine both systems to function as one unit.
Boyle said that while he was try-
perienced problems with the current bus system.
"When I rode the't' I had to catch two buses to get where I needed to go," Myles said of the city transportation system,
He said that it often would take
SCHEDULES
www.lawrencetransit.org/routes/schedules.shtml
www.ku.edu/~kuwheels/bussystem/routemaps.html
ing to gain a sense of what the most important issues were regarding both systems, he couldn't yet tell if the public wants to integrate the systems.
Robbie Myles, Olathe senior, said that change was needed. Myles, who lived at Parkway Commons, Clinton Pkwy and Kasaold, last year, didn't own a car at the time and said he ex-
him 30 minutes to catch a ride to campus, taking a bus from his apartment complex to SuperTarget, and then transferring to another bus to get to campus. He also said that he would have liked the buses to run later than they did.
A lack of later running times was just one of the complaints expressed by meeting participants. Others included routing, accessibility for those with disabilities, timing for transfers, uncleanliness and both environmental and noise pollution.
Lawrence Settles, Shawnee senior, who attended the meeting at City Hall, said he was happy that people were trying to improve the bus systems.
"I'm an advocate for public transportation," he said.
Boyle's firm specializes in public transportation, and has completed studies in other college towns. He did one study at the University of Nevada at Reno, and will be conducting another that will serve six universities in Greensboro, N.C. The current study began last week and is scheduled to end some time in November.
-Edited by Dani Hurst
The project will be completed in two phases.The first will make the overall transit situation in Lawrence better; the second will gauge whether it's possible to combine KU on Wheels and the Lawrence Transit System.
ADMINISTRATION
New staff eager to begin life in Lawrence
BY DANI HURST
dhurst@kansan.com
KANSAN STAFF WRITER
The first two times Omri Gillath visited Lawrence it was snowing, which was different for him, having lived in both warm-weathered Israel and California.
The social psychologist will ar-
live at The University of Kansas as a faculty member in the department of psychology at the beginning of August. He is able to join the University's faculty because of funding created by the five-year tuition enhancement plan, the tuition increase that took effect in 2003..
Moving from California will be a transition for his family but Gillath said he is excited about the change.
fun."
Gillath will begin his teaching and research in neuroscience combined with social and personality psychology at the University this fall semester as one of about 30 new faculty members that the University has recently hired. By the end of 2007, approximately 100 new faculty members will
"We have more faculty to interact with students. That's the bottom line. If you're investing with faculty, you're investing in the highest impact for students."
"Lawrence seems to be a nice, pleasant city," Gillath said. "I have a feeling it will be exciting and
Stuart Bell Dean of School of Engineering
to Gillath, the department of psychology also hired Kris Preacher, quantitative psychologist and former University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill faculty member. Preacher will conduct research and teach graduate courses in psychology at the University, starting
Every school on the Lawrence campus and the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences received funding to hire new faculty.
have been hired with the funds raised by the tuition plan.
In addition
in August.
Preacher expressed his sentiments about the University and why he decided to join the faculty, in an e-mail. He said the University had one of the few, high-quality quantitative psychology programs in the country. He also said the department has a world-wide reputation for excellence and the faculty was welcoming.
The School of Engineering was allocated funds to hire three new faculty members. One of those individuals is Javier Guzman, who will be an assistant professor in chemical and petroleum engineering and researcher at the Center for Environmentally Beneficial Catalysis. Before Guzman came to the University, he was in Spain at the Valencia Polytechnic University on a postdoctoral fellowship.
Stuart Bell, dean of School of Engineering, said the new hires were a great investment for many reasons.
"We have more faculty to interact with students," Bell said. "That's the bottom line. If you're investing with faculty, you're investing in the highest impact for students."
Bell also said that hiring new
Jeff Jacobsen/KU ATHLETICS
This graph shows the number of faculty in each college or school hired by the University of Kansas since the Tuition Enhancement Program began in 2003. A total of 100 faculty have been hired.
faculty brings attention to the University from other schools and brings a certain level of prestige to the degrees students earn
at the University.
—Edited by Jancece Gatson