Lack of drivers causes Stingerette delays

Some students may face problems over the next several weeks with the Stingerette transportation service, including delays and diminished numbers of Stingerettes. The problems are due to the departure of two Stingerette drivers and other recent staff changes.

The Stingerette service is composed of six drivers. Recently, two of the drivers have found other job opportunities and moved on.

One driver found a different job within Tech itself, whereas the other has moved outside of Tech.

One of the service ' s current drivers has been asked to take over the role of the operations dispatcher while remaining a driver. The service has also found a temporary replacement for one of the resigned employees, so they are down one full-time driver from the usual six drivers.

According to David Williamson, assistant director of Parking and Transportation Services, the program is moving as quickly as possible to bring the service back to full force. " We are looking at a time frame of two weeks here before which we go back to normal. "

The Stingerette service has four operating vans in the evenings from 6:30 p.m. to 2:30 a.m. Fewer drivers operate on weekends. " We have three drivers on Saturdays and four drivers on Sundays, " Williamson said.

In an average evening, the service receives 300 calls. The drivers are busy during the days with scheduled pick-ups of handicapped students, as well as others who typically use the service.

While drivers try run as smoothly as possible in periods like these, there are often unavoidable delays on rainy days.

" We are as flexible as possible but we try to stick to the schedule pre-planned for weekdays as well as weekends, " Williamson said.

Linda Dillon, administrative coordinator and human resources officer in the department, said, " It is really difficult to predict the conditions and whether it is going to rain or not . We have built up our schedule based on the number of calls we expect every day, " she said.

" We have thoroughly researched when the demand for the service is the highest and have placed more drivers at these times of the week, " Dillon added.

When asked whether the service will hire more drivers to increase their efficiency as well as reduce the workload on the current drivers, Williamson said that they had to stick to six drivers due to budget reasons.

" I understand that the demand for the Stingerette service has grown over the years, " he said. " It is well-received by the student body but financially, we can ' t go beyond this. "

Two main groups of students tend to be the sources of most calls to the service.

" We find that a large number of freshmen, since they do not have cars, call for the service, " Dillon said. " Furthermore, students who study late at night in the library call the service as well. "

Among the most common callers are students who work well with the service.

According to Williams, " Repetitive users have formed relationships with the drivers and so they have arranged times when they want to be picked up from the library and dropped in the dorm everyday. This is good, " he said.

When asked whether they knew that the service faced a shortage in drivers, first year Electrical Engineering major Prerna Bang said the department could do a better job in advertising their website as that is their primary means of communication with students.

Bang said, " They could be more honest in their replies on how long it would take them before picking us up. Sometimes they refuse to answer our calls. "

Bang said that the service seemed to lack efficiency as compared to last semester.