Acorn

Drew students had a chance to get a taste of the Big Apple last week when New Jersey Transit offered free rides to and from New York City, and any other public transportation destinations, to all New Jersey college students. The free rides were offered from Jan. 30 through Feb. 5 to ?give students the opportunity to experience how simple it is to use public transportation,? according to a press release on the NJ Transit website. Students simply had to present their student ID and free ride coupon, available after taking a survey on the corporation?s website, on any NJ Transit bus, rail or light rail line in order to receive the discount.

?The survey was really easy,? senior Verna Nienhouse said. ?It only took a couple of minutes.?

?I go into the city fairly normally, so I was glad it was free,? senior Jason Petrucci said. ?I was planning on going in anyway, but it was nice that I did not have to pay.?

The goal of the program is to acquaint college students with the state?s public transportation system. ?We want students to discover how comfortable and convenient using NJ Transit can be,? NJ Transit Assistant Executive Director Lynn Bowersox said in the press release. ?By giving them an opportunity to ride ? for free, we are cultivating new customers during their college years and beyond.?

?I am not from the [New York metropolitan area], so being able to go into the city for free helped a lot with getting used to the train system,? freshman Matthew Dembowski said. ?I will definitely go again.? Fellow freshman Jennifer Richter, who went into New York City with Dembowski, agrees.

?I think it encourages people to use the train more often in the future, because the more you do it the more you get used to it,? she said. ?So yes, the program works.?

According to the NJ Transit website, in only the first four days of the event, more than 33,000 students took advantage of the free tickets. Drew students were no exception.

?When we took the train, there was a whole car full of Drew and other college students,? Richter said. ?And when we got to the city we saw groups of Drew students walking all around.?

?On the way back to Madison I did see quite a few Drew students, so I would say more went in this weekend compared to others,? senior Courtney Reisman said.

?I ran into people going into the city on the way there and the way back,? junior Daniel Moore said.

For some students, the free ticket days coincided with trips they already planned.

?I went into the city on Monday and Thursday because I had made plans to see lectures at New York University, not because it was free,? Petrucci said. ?However, I was planning on going in a third time to Chinatown, and that would have been because it was free.?

?I was planning a trip [to New York City] for the beginning of the semester, but we moved it up earlier because the ride was free,? Reisman said. ?We shopped in Soho and the Village and ate lunch in Union Square.?

Although most students were only able to use the free ticket once, some went into New York several times.

The free ride weekend was also a trial of the new NJ Transit Student Pass program, which provides a ?25 percent discount to full-time students attending participating colleges,? according to the NJ Transit website. The pilot program was created in 2004 in partnership with several New Jersey colleges including Rutgers, Fairleigh Dickinson and Seton Hall Universities.

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