We are considering purchasing a charter bus for faculty/staff/students to use for trips from our campus in Eugene, OR to Portland, OR (2 hours away).

Has anyone else done this used or analyzed such an approach? Our first round of research revealed that a large number of faculty/staff were submitting travel reimbursements, or renting vehicles through a state university system, to travel from Eugene to Portland on Thursday and Friday of most weeks. Our idea is to save resources by carpooling and make better use of faculty/staff time by offering them a luxury coach on which to work rather than drive alone.

The environmental sustainability benefits are essentially those of carpooling, but with up to 24 people on a 4-hour round trip. We've calculated that the university's savings from travel reimbursements could pay for the bus. Of even greater financial benefit would be the more productive use of faculty/staff time, who could work on their laptops, read, talk on the phone, or network/share ideas in person rather than drive a SOV.

To make it worthwhile for busy faculty and staff to take a bus rather than hop in their car -- a significant consideration -- we are looking at a very nice coach, retrofitted for our needs.

If you know of any projects like this and would like to discuss this, post a comment or contact me directly.

Stephen Ames

sames@uoregon.edu
541-646-3489

Policies and Programming
Office of Sustainability
University of Oregon
Eugene, OR