No more Parking Permit for me!


I finally did it and turned in my Yellow Washington University parking permit and am now completely mass transit dependent. Now that my daughter is enrolled here as a student and no longer working at our library, I had no reason to drive as we had been doing all summer (since she was not eligible for a free U-Pass as a temporary summer employee) . We will now save $40 a month on parking, take one more car off the mid-county roads during rush hour, and save a spot in the university's parking lots and garages for other folks. Previously this past Spring I had been driving to the Metrolink garage in Brentwood, but now I am even stopping that and just walking to the bus and either taking #58 to the the Clayton Metrolink, or taking #2 from Brentwood all the way to campus. If we want to keep the buses rolling we should all try to use them! I do not understand why the Metro buses always seem so empty, and yet the Metrolink trains are always crowded (primarily with Wash U/BJC folks). I think riding the Metrobuses is just fine! They seem clean, safe and the drivers are always courteous when I ride them.

Today I tried Metrobus #2 for the first time after taking #58 for the past couple weeks and I was amazed to be the only person on the bus at the Rose/Brentwood stop. Maybe 7:50am was too early for other commuting folks to be on the bus route yet! However, there finally was a second person on the bus in front of the Schnucks on Clayton Road... and it was someone I knew from our library upstairs in my building where my daughter had been working (what were the odds of that happening?) A psychology graduate student got on the bus shortly after that, and then a fourth person, another Wash U employee who I also happened to know (hi, Mike!). So I actually knew 50% of the people on the bus until I got off at Wydown/Skinker, and I even had the pleasure of walking and talking with the delightful person upstairs all the way to our building. That surely cannot happen sitting in your car driving to a parking lot, now can it?

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