Rice’s ‘urban’ status gets us nowhere without cars

When the Princeton Review’s The Best 351 Colleges tells college-bound students Rice University is in an “urban” environment, it does not really give them a clear picture of what life inside the hedges is actually like.

The word “urban” connotes easy access to restaurants and shops, readily accessible public transportation and being part of a larger community. Rice, however, offers none of these things. Outside the hedges of our insulated world lie houses and hospitals. It takes at least 15 minutes of walking to see a compact grouping of eateries and stores. And for a pedestrian walking in the Houston heat, with car exhaust providing the only breeze, that trek can start to feel like crossing the entire Sahara.

“Urban” implies an array of entertainment options and a bustling nightlife. Not much is bustling over at the Medical Center on Saturday nights that is of interest to students, aside from pre-med junkies whose orgo textbooks just aren’t cutting it for them. The only Rice Village nightlife fun for students under 21 is admiring the Banana Republic mannequins. And going down to the private homes bordering the other side of campus does not provide much entertainment either — that is, unless voyeurism is your thing.

Students flock to urban schools because they want something more than what the campus has to offer. If they did not mind spending every weekend on campus, they be in Nowheresville, Minnesota instead of Houston, Texas. Since Rice is billed as an urban school, Rice has an obligation to get students into Houston.

Perhaps the university forgets only 52.7 percent of its students hail from Texas. That leaves 47.3 percent flocking from all over the nation and the globe. Surely, a student from Germany is not expected to drive her car across the Atlantic Ocean to the Lone Star State. It seems a bit ridiculous. In truth, not even all Texas-born-and-bred students bring cars to campus. About 75 percent of the undergraduate student body is vehicle-less here.

Members of the People WithOut Cars group on Facebook.com would not be in such a predicament if Houston had a thriving public transportation system. But when the bus on Kirby stops running at 8:30 p.m. on Saturday nights, no U-Pass from the university is going to help students looking to go out, explore Houston and have a good time. We are college students, not seven-year-olds with a 9 p.m. curfew.

Rice’s money would be better spent investing in its own private shuttle or van service to take students farther from campus than the Village or Target, because, let’s face it: Detergent shopping does not sound like much of a Saturday night escapade either. We could instead have shuttles going to popular urban areas like the Galleria, Westheimer clubs, bars, cafes and the Heights, to name a few. This practical expense would also cut down on the number of students who over-pack cars to accommodate an entire group of people on a weekend outing. Students should not have to travel unsafely when the mere re-allocation of funds could prevent it.

Houston, the nation’s fourth-largest city, has much to offer the college student, provided she has the means to conquer the 10-lane highways and endless surface streets. We should not fall into a Rice-centric mentality. The university owes us an opportunity to immerse ourselves in this hotbed of cultural activity. Otherwise, it’s Nowheresville, here I come.

Arianne Urus is a Hanszen College freshman.

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