Matt Howe curated this story by David Harrison, which The Appalachian published Feb. 7, 1980.
After just 22 days of operation, a “hue and cry” among riders of the new AppalCart bus system at ASU has lead to an expansion of the system, soon to begin serving the shopping center area of south Boone.
According to John Simmons, director of publications for the University, the AppalCart will begin transporting students to and from the Bavarian Village apartment complex, Watauga Hospital area and the shopping centers.
When the expanded services will definitely begin is as yet unknown, Simmons said, but it is expected to be within the next week.
Early morning, afternoon and night services will begin. The times have been set from 7:20 a.m. until 9:13 a.m. and from 2:20 p.m. until 9:20 p.m.
The bus system is being used as an experiment for the spring semester and the administration hopes that it will alleviate the cronic parking problem which the campus now has and will make it easier to get around campus.
“We know that if we could get all the potential riders at the Bavarian Village alone we could keep 300 cars from coming on campus to park each day,” Simmons said yesterday.
“The hue and cry was so great to go to the shopping centers,” he said. “Though it’s surprising that it’s changing so soon, it’s a change that can be made fairly easily,” he added.
“Yes, there was a lot of requests for it (the expansion),” said Roy Tugman, director of Campus Security which is in charge of the bus service.
“We feel we’ll get much more ridership by going out into that direction,” he said.
Currently, two buses travel north and south routes for inner-campus transit during morning hours. One bus is operated after noon each weekday.
The addition of serving the shopping areas along hwy. 321 will mean that one of the buses used during early morning hours will be diverted to Boone’s south side until just after 9 a.m. Since only one bus is used for afternoon campus transit the expanded service for the shopping centers will have no effect on the present bus schedule after 2 p.m. each weekday. The bus stops to be used on the expanded route have not yet been designated.
According to Tugman and Simmons, two additional licensed drivers will be selected for the expanded service. Neither expect the extra drivers to run the AppalCart system over its projected $30,000 budget for the spring semester.
University releases have said that administration officials hope the bus system, if successful, can continue to be used after June when the experiment officially ends.
