Tag: rutgersbusses

Bussing Around

shreyad147 Comments

Guys, this one hurt. This #RUScrew fucked me big time because important, valuable time was lost.

So it was my first week on campus and finally the week was coming to an end. I only had one class on Fridays and it wasn’t too early in the morning. What sucked was that I had work in the morning. On Cook/Doug to make it worse, too. I lived on Livingston at the quads so you already know that that bus ride took a minute.

But I was a happy camper that first week. I woke up early, showered, and even went to the dining hall to get a nice breakfast. That was an accomplishment because what student chooses breakfast over sleep? I was naive.

So I tracked the RexL timing while eating and when time came, I left the dining hall to hop on the bus. I worked my shift from 11:00-2:00 at a building right by College Hall. My one Friday class was at Busch at 3:20 so when I got off of work I knew I had plenty of time to go back to my dorm. I was more tired than I expected and was CRAVING a nap. It was great that College Hall was the last stop on Cook/Doug too because I went straight back to Livi.

I debated getting off at the Student Center but then decided that I really needed the sleep so I’d just get off at the Quads instead. That sleep was about to be YUMMY.

Imagine my horror. Just thinking about it feels like I’m getting fucked over again. The bus JUST DROVE PAST THE QUADS. #RUScrew

Me looking out the window as the RexL drove past the Quads

Before I knew it, I was back on the main roads traveling BACK TO COOK/DOUG. I kid you not I was speechless for a solid 5 minutes. I knew for a fact that my mouth was hanging low out of astonishment. I finally gathered the courage to ask a girl next to me, “hey did the bus forget to stop at the Quads?” and she replied, “no the bus doesn’t go to the Quads.” That sounded insane because I’d literally watched in slow motion as we drove PAST the quads.

“I want my sleep!!”

I was mad. Like highkey mad. I’d been robbed of my nap time – nap time that I had created by giving up my food time. So I was hungry AND sleepy. I sat like the most sour faced person in that bus as I did ANOTHER LOOP around that farm of a campus called Cook/ Doug. My face was the literal definition of a “resting bitch face” at that point. Water fell on me from the bus AC, making me even more annoyed. Nice, I didn’t know it was supposed to rain inside busses, Rutgers. I couldn’t even go directly to Busch from Cook/Doug because I had to grab my homework from my dorm. That was the first day that seeds of pure irritation were planted in my head about the Rutgers busses.

I soon realized how annoying the RexL was. It never stopped at the Quads, which meant that regardless of whether I was getting breakfast or not, I’d have to account for that extra 13 minute walk to the student center from my dorm. What was worse? If I missed a RexL that was it. You might as well just take a nap at the student center because the next one sure as hell wasn’t coming for another 30 minutes.

But it didn’t stop at the RexL. That was just the beginning. You couldn’t risk having class on another campus at that prime 3:20 period, god no. If you did, like me you probably watched as 3 B busses would pass you before you even had enough space to get on. By then you were already late.

These aren’t students eager to learn, they’re students frustrated to be crammed in the LX

While I never had classes on College Ave last semester, this semester I realize the same is true for the 4:30 time period. The LX busses are even worse because they are so TINY that 5 packed busses will easily pass you until you get on. Even when you did get on, you would either be standing the whole ride as someone’s backpack continuously smacked you left and right, or sitting down uncomfortable close to someones waist. And guess what? You don’t know if the bus driver is going to take one of those spontaneous 10 minute breaks at the student center. This happened to me just last week friends – as you all might’ve witnessed me walk in late to our very own Creative Writing class.

Image result for rutgers bus meme

Friends, there are some HEAVY improvements that must be done to the bussing system, starting with the RexL stopping at the Quads. Yes. I’m still salty. I don’t kid when I say I want to petition for it. I expect all of you to sign it, of course. Also, maybe add more busses in circulation during rush hour? We all just trying to get that “edumacation” out here.

But while these improvements have long ways to go, take some of this advice:

  1. Leave for class early if it’s during rush hour. You’ll either get there 15 minutes early or 30 minutes late, and trust me the first is the better option.
  2. Work around the bus drivers break schedule by tracking the number on the bus. Each bus has a number next to the rearview mirror for the driver. You can click on each ETA on the bus app and see if it’s your bus number arriving at that time.
  3. If you live on Cook/Doug, may god bless your soul for working around your late bus schedule and insane walking distance to the bus stops. Only god can help you survive any #RUScrews.

Humid Horror or Freezing Fright: No In-Between

shreyad145 Comments

You don’t really know what weather is until you’ve been a student at Rutgers.

My first day of class and I’m sitting in a lecture hall among 400 other students. It’s September and it must be a solid 90 something degrees outside, adding a few degrees when accounting for humidity. It’s a chemistry lecture so you can imagine we’re all already pretty agitated. Rutgers University, a university as big as 5 campuses and home to roughly 50,000 undergraduate students, DOESN’T HAVE ANY AIR CONDITIONING ON in this huge lecture hall. The day was not pretty. My friend and I were sweating our asses through our jeans. But perhaps that simple description doesn’t justify the extreme ness of the heat. I casually look behind me to see how many students are coming in still and I see a girl at the edge of row JUST STRIP HER SHIRT. My girl was just chilling there in her hot pink bra in the middle of lecture. You would really think that a college that we pay thousands in tuition for would take simple precautions of turning on the AC to ensure no one dies of a heat stroke but nah. #RUScrew.


Now it’s the same day but I’m in a different lecture hall, one that holds roughly 500-600 students. This room has the air condition CRANKED UP HIGH. It was like Antarctica in there. I had to get up and pee twice and if it wasn’t so hard to navigate through the row seating, I would’ve went the third time. I really couldn’t win. I thought if I wore a tank top to my classes I’d survive the melting pot of students that we were becoming, but no. That’s when I learned that the key to RU during summer was layering.

While thoughts of sweating like a pig were horrifying, believe it or not, Rutgers ALMOST made me miss those days. I came back from winter break and for some odd reason, my dorm room was the same temperature inside as it was outside. My guy. It’s 2 degrees outside.Why is there no heat in my dorm room?? Now, that was easily handled with full sleeve sweaters and double layering on my blankets but the worst part came in the morning. I hopped in the shower to get ready for class and the water was SO COLD that that shit was PIERCING INTO MY SKIN. I was numb as hell. I had shampoo in my hair and I’m dancing around in the shower trying to keep my blood flow going as I wash out all the suds. This went on for A WEEK. I don’t know why these issues weren’t handled quicker. There were people who didn’t have their heat turned on till much later than a week. My friends would walk out and head to class and their hair would be FROZEN.

My friend’s hair frozen


The extreme cold was a battle on its own. When the snow was added in, it literally became chaos. Leave it to Rutgers to not cancel any classes while the rest of the surrounding public universities are shutting down. No, we had everything still up and running, no matter how delayed. I got on a shuttle bus to head to class the day that it was snowing and I was in there for AN HOUR. The ride is supposed to be an exact 8 minutes. That shit was moving at the literal pace of a turtle. Like, if it really was that hard to drive then the University should’ve been shut down. My class had ended by the time I got to Busch campus. #RUScrew

Some lessons really required the experience to learn all that I did. With the huge university that we are, small problems, which are big to a single individual, go unnoticed. We just have to maneuver around them. Be prepared for all weather types and take into account any delays while traveling and maybe, just maybe, you won’t be RUScrewed.