How High a Priority?

FOR years, students have been complaining that for one reason or another, Harvard's police-run escort service has refused them transportation. People have been told they can't use the service because they live too far away or because they use the service too often. Sometimes there haven't been enough cars; sometimes there haven't been enough drivers. Others have been told that if they want a ride, they have to wait outside--alone--until a car arrives.

In a city the size of Cambridge, this situation is unacceptable. Violent crimes occur here every day--for example, one shuttle bus driver recently was accosted after parking his bus near the Business School. Unless the University does something to address a growing security problem, it is only a matter of time before the next student is mugged, assaulted or raped.

Operating the shuttle buses 24 hours a day, as the Undergraduate Council has proposed, would help matters somewhat, but not enough. At its best, an all-night shuttle service to insure student safety would be both inadequate and inefficient.

In fact, nothing is wrong with the basic concept of a door-to-door escort service. Properly run, it provides transportation for students exactly when they need it, without forcing them to walk long distances.

SHUTTLE buses operate on a fixed route and a fixed schedule. That means that a person trying to get home late at night has to wait outside for the bus. And a single person waiting on a street corner at four in the morning is a tempting target for would-be criminals.

Trying to address the security problem with a 24-hour shuttle system also betrays a disturbing bias toward undergraduates who live in the house system. Students who live in Currier House are home when the shuttle drops them off. But graduate students and students who live off campus may face a 10 to 15-minute walk, during which time they are again vulnerable.

Shuttle buses are a convenient way to move large numbers of people to a common destination. It makes sense to operate a shuttle from the Quad to the Science Center at five minutes to ten. It makes less sense to run an all-night shuttle service for a few scattered groups of people. Most of the night, the buses would drive from one end of campus to the other, empty.

It is also difficult to see how operating the shuttle for longer hours later at night would help protect drivers, as some on the council have argued.

INSTEAD of extending the shuttle system, what the University ought to do is revamp the escort service. Here are a few suggestions:

Take the service out of the hands of the police. Make it run all night, from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. Equip it with enough cars and drivers to accommodate the number of students who want to use it. And most important, write the following sentence into the escort service rules: "No persons holding a valid Harvard ID shall be denied transportation to their place of residence or to or from any Harvard building on the Cambridge or Allston campuses." Obviously, a certain, fixed distance, preferably encompassing Cambridge and the nearby outlying areas, should be established so that the escort system does not degenerate into a free taxi service.

Harvard also needs to make students aware of the escort service's existence. Council members have argued that many students are "embarrassed" to use the service, but it is equally likely that people just don't know about it. The University puts up signs telling students to lock their doors. It could just as easily post more notices urging them not to walk home alone. Phone numbers for police and University Health Services are listed on the back of ID cards--why not the number for the escort service?

But despite years of criticism, the University has made no substantive changes in the escort service. Harvard could make the system work if it really wanted to make the effort and spend the money. The need for improvements grows more clear with each attack on a student. Harvard's failure to address the problem indicates the low priority the University gives to what should be one of its foremost concerns: the safety of its students.