Lack of reliable transportation is a significant barrier preventing many college students from accessing higher education. With a consistent means to travel to campus for classes and academic activities, the path toward earning a college degree becomes extremely easy, if not impossible, for some students. Expanding transportation opportunities for college students who currently struggle with accessing campus provides a vital step toward educational equity (Cruz-Rodríguez et al.). There are strong social, economic, practical, and ethical justifications for providing funding and infrastructure to supply college students—especially those from disadvantaged backgrounds—with accessible and affordable transport options connecting them to campus.
Many college students face precarious financial circumstances, making personal vehicle ownership unrealistic (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Data indicates that over half of today’s college students qualify as low-income, with some full-time undergraduate students even meeting definitions for deep poverty (Cruz-Rodríguez et al.). Given economic constraints, purchasing, insuring, maintaining, fueling, and parking a personal car on or near campus proves cost-prohibitive for many students striving to afford higher education’s other numerous expenses, from tuition to textbooks to housing. Lacking the financial means to depend on a personal car, these students must patch together alternative unreliable arrangements potentially involving long walks, inconsistent public transit, depending on others for rides, and irregular rideshare services (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). The unpredictability leads many to occasionally miss classes or academic activities—expanding transportation would provide disadvantaged students consistency.
University car assistance programs providing discounted or free vehicles to financially disadvantaged students would help close this mobility gap. Research reveals that “car ownership increased the likelihood that a student would choose to drive rather than selecting other modes” (Setiawan, Santosa & Sjafruddin, 2017). Therefore, supplying cars to lower-income students eliminates transportation disadvantages, stopping many scholars from utilizing automobiles. Findings also show that “car access affects the behaviour of students in using cars more dominantly rather than the existence of habits” (Setiawan, Santosa & Sjafruddin). If colleges furnish students struggling economically with car access, it empowers them to adopt driving for school commutes when preferable or necessary. Vehicle assistance initiatives grant all admitted students, regardless of income level, the same opportunities to leverage automobiles’ convenience and control for accessing higher education.
Public transit access near college campuses also needs to improve to meet many students’ transportation needs (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). While universities concentrated in urban areas may benefit from proximity to more extensive municipal bus and rail networks, public systems are only sometimes designed to serve students’ schedules and locations. Buses following fixed routes and timetables often need to be more useful in connecting where students live to facilities where morning, afternoon, evening, and weekend classes occur. Public transportation also proves challenging to reach colleges in small towns or rural areas. Linking students still learning to drive with campus shuttles and other school-operated vehicles tailored to serving academic requirements would provide targeted solutions, overcoming limitations of broader public transit systems.
Students sharing rides using dynamic carpooling enabled by digital platforms have emerged as an alternative option but also has disadvantages. Ridesharing services can provide cheaper and more customized trips than fixed bus or subway routes (Sun et al.). However, rideshares also need to be more consistent when relying upon other individuals’ driving availability and willingness to provide rides. Economic motivations of drivers looking to profit can also complicate coordinating reliable rides tailored to precise academic needs. Dedicated college transport infrastructure would be more dependable without uncertainties introduced by an ad hoc jigsaw puzzle of rideshares.
Further evidence that transportation limitations disproportionately affect marginalized groups emphasizes why colleges should expand student access. Data reveals that college students from higher-income backgrounds drive cars at three times the rate of their lower-income peers for commuting to campus—45% compared to 13% respectively (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Numbers also indicate that students from more privileged backgrounds receive family vehicles at seven times the frequency of students from disadvantaged families while attending college—42% compared to 6% correspondingly (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Providing transportation where inequities exist aligns with higher education’s mission of serving students from all backgrounds.
Economic mobility also motivates the provision of transportation, enabling lower-income students to access and complete college. Graduating with a bachelor’s degree sees typical income grow 81% over simply having a high school diploma—from $30,000 to $54,000 by one estimate (Cruz-Rodríguez et al.). Supporting students to earn degrees despite transportation disadvantages means more historically sidelined groups can achieve improved financial security. Investing in transit simultaneously invests in populations where economic progress holds opportunity for generational impact.
Traffic reduction and environmental benefits present additional justifications for funding transport alternatives (Cruz-Rodríguez et al.). Campuses overwhelmed by high volumes of cars have explored restricting permits, levying fees, and even constructing expensive parking facilities (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Supplying subsidized shuttles, vans, buses, and transit passes alleviates overcrowded roads and emissions while avoiding passing costs to students through parking permit rate hikes. Savings from scaling back parking also free funding applicable to zero-emission electric fleet vehicles, further slashing colleges’ carbon footprints. Investing in transport capacity like bike garages and repair stations available to students at nominal or no cost also incentivizes carbon-neutral mobility choices.
While critics contend that young people today lack the motivation to travel beyond what is convenient, research indicates that college students respond to opportunities by incentivizing environmentally conscious transport choices. Over half of the surveyed students selected public transit when buses enabled reduced travel times over driving—57% compared to 38% opting to use personal vehicles in one study (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Providing transport alternatives like shuttles can have an even greater impact, lowering students’ tendency to default toward cars aligned with a broader culture of automobile dominance. Implementing complimentary transit passes allowing free usage of municipal buses and subways also saw over 85% of students decrease private car commuting (Sun et al.). Investing in transit provides students with viable options where environmental motivations can further multiply reductions in carbon emissions.
From legal and ethical standpoints, institutions accepting financial aid and government funds to deliver public education also hold heightened duties supplying the means enabling financed students to access the services promised. A given portion of instruction, facilities, administration and research at public universities is paid for with tax dollars or philanthropic gifts; a given proportion of tuition costs falls to the share contributed by willing citizens. The money that pays pretax rents on campuses comes from student services funds. Also, offsetting portions are again grants allotted by local governments (Sun et al.).While taking in pooled public money, the responsibilities of providing policy underpinnings for equitable access still need to be met, which prompts misalignment questions as to whether the objective or rationale itself by higher learning institutions is an investment with agreed-upon public purposes. Reasonably, people expect government agencies to make transportation systems available to serve students of the economically disadvantaged, who are most vulnerable in terms of exclusion due to school closures.
Likewise, policy discussions regarding making community college and public four-year college tuition universally free or debt-free place even greater importance on ensuring enrolled students can actually leverage the paid-for education opportunity. However, if campuses get money to negate tuition as a barrier but sit on their thumbs about transportation, then the equation is still unbalanced. According to logic, public dollars should be used not only for the costs of courses and curricula but also for everything else that stands in the way. Constructing sound transportation infrastructure is the concrete means by which policies promoting expanded access can be carried out.
In conclusion, reliable transportation enabling physical attendance expands opportunities for today’s students facing economic disadvantages (Setiawan, Santosa, & Sjafruddin). Investing in transit infrastructure lifts barriers to academic achievement existing along socioeconomic divides. More environmentally friendly forms of transportation also help decongest the campus and cut down on carbon emissions, resulting in a chain reaction. Linking disadvantaged students with classrooms, libraries, laboratories, and student support services will contribute most to educational fairness and upward mobility, where it could do the most significant good for a community. The duties to ensure all admitted students will have a chance at funded education journeys should include shuttle systems, discounted transit passes, bike share programs, and sustainable mobility solutions.
Works Cited
Cruz-Rodríguez, J., Luque-Sendra, A., Heras, A. de las, & Zamora-Polo, F. (2020). Analysis of Interurban Mobility in University Students: Motivation and Ecological Impact. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 17(24), 9348. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17249348
Setiawan, R., Santosa, W., & Sjafruddin, A. (2015). Effect of Habit and Car Access on Student Behavior Using Cars for Traveling to Campus. Procedia Engineering, 125, 571–578. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.proeng.2015.11.063
Setiawan, R., Santosa, W., & Sjafruddin, A. (2017). The Effect of Students’ Car Access and Car use Habits on Student Behavior to Reduce using Cars for Traveling to Campus. Procedia Engineering, 171, 1454–1462. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.proeng.2017.01.468
Sun, S., Liu, Y., Yao, Y., Duan, Z., & Wang, X. (2021). The Determinants to Promote College Students’ Use of Car-Sharing: An Empirical Study at Dalian Maritime University, China. Sustainability, 13(12), 6627. https://doi.org/10.3390/su13126627
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