Campus News
By Dominic DeGrinney, Staff Writer
Cincinnati Metro will continue to offer Xavier students free bus passes, allowing access to the city’s mass transit fleet.
This month, Cincinnati Metro renewed their “Metro University Ridership Program,” its university discount promotion program to encourage ridership among students to ease commuting, parking hassles and costs.
Xavier connects to the metro system via nine stops that service five separate routes, which travel to places such as The Central Business District, Over-the-Rhine, University of Cincinnati, Hyde Park and Kenwood. Services to these places, provided by Metro, can be an option for students to attend events downtown when parking is scarce.
“I guess I lived under a rock because I didn’t know that this was an option last semester. I’ve been wanting to explore Cincinnati more and now that I can get down there at no cost, I’ll definitely look into getting a free pass,” junior finance major Ally Baur said.
Students can now have access to a free Cincinnati Metro bus pass throughout the spring semester, allowing them access to parking-free events in downtown Cincinnati.
To access the passes provided by Cincinnati Metro students must download the navigation app “Transit” and create an account with their Xavier email. After doing so, students must go online to the portal provided on this page. Once verified, students should begin receiving their free bus passes, which they may use at any time on their phone. To use their bus passes, students need to present the QR Code to the bus scanner upon boarding.
While using the app, students will find that they can view data including the approximate location, capacity and timing of the bus. This is done through crowdsourced data from other transit users who contribute via surveys and mobile phone GPS data, all of which helps provide data to Cincinnati Metro.
“I already had the transit app from when I visited other places. So, it was really easy to put in Cincinnati’s location and look at all the public transit options near me,” Baur said.
These measures allow transit users to help other riders plan their trips. This process depletes phone battery fast, but most Cincinnati buses are outfitted with outlets and Wi-Fi to accommodate mobile device needs.
