Rerouted

Recently, the Harvard administration announced that budget cuts to the Quad shuttle service would be less substantial than previously stated. Last semester, students responded with understandable outrage to a College proposal to halt weeknight shuttle service at 1:30 AM. But now they can rest assured: The College has agreed to keep Quad shuttles running through 3:45 AM, meaning that weekday service will not be modified at all. Students returning to the Quad from late nights studying in Lamont, socializing at the river, and engaging in extracurricular activities in the yard area will no longer be left out in the cold.

The revised set of cuts, which is limited to weekend mornings—when shuttles are little used and safety concerns less pressing—seems more reasonable.

The policy reversal likely results from the vocal response to the original plan from the undergraduate population. Concerned students organized protests, circulated petitions, and made their voices heard. Students without a doubt deserve credit for organizing and expressing their displeasure effectively enough to force the College to change its plans.

It is also encouraging to see that the administration kept an open mind about student feedback and revised their plan accordingly. The administration should learn from this experience, and make sure to gather greater student input before implementing policy changes in the future, rather than only learning about policy flaws after the fact. Hopefully, this welcome correction to the shuttle policy will be the beginning of a closer working relationship between the student body and the administration.