Council asks for bike advice

The fate of bicycles on Locust Walk has been passed on to faculty and students after University Council members yesterday failed to act on a proposal to ban bikes from campus. And Safety and Security Committee member Helen Davies said the committee plans to increase student input on security issues by appointing alternates to sit in for students who she said are frequently unable to attend meetings. Davies' proposal will compensate somewhat for last November's Council decision to increase the number of faculty members on the Safety and Security Committee, giving professors more votes than they had had previously. The committee's bicycle control proposal would prohibit bicycle riding on Locust Walk, Hamilton Walk and Smith Walk. It would also provide suitable bicycle parking facilities on the periphery of campus, and mandate a five-mile-per-hour speed limit on other areas of campus. Safety and Security Committee Chairperson Adelaide Delluva said that while she knows the recommendations are "rather Draconian," she hopes they will be discussed and suggestions for improvement made. UA, Graduate and Professional Student Assembly and Faculty Senate leaders were told to ask their constituencies for suggestions on how to control the bicycle problem. Both students and faculty members at yesterday's monthly Council meeting criticized the proposal, saying bicycle control is an issue, but the recommendations are too drastic. "I find it hard to tell fellow undergraduates that they can no longer ride [down Locust Walk]," said Council Steering member You-Lee Kim. College junior Kim added that she found the proposed five-mile-per-hour speed limit on all other University walkways difficult to understand. "I can walk faster than that," she said. But other Council members supported the committee's reccomendations, citing the dangers that bicycles pose to pedestrians on the Walks. "I've had more close encounters with bicycles than I care to recall," said Finance Professor Emeritus Jean Crockett. "I don't understand why bicyclists cannot walk down Locust Walk if that's the way they have to go." In other business, Council members voted to table a resolution that would have abolished the Council Committee on Undergraduate Admissions and Financial Aid. Instead, Council Steering Committee members will review the Admissions Committee charter and will rework it to cover a broader range of topics in order to prevent overlap with the Provost's Committee on Undergraduate Admissions. At last month's Council meeting, faculty and administrators proposed abolishing the committee because they said the same work is done by the Provost's committee. Undergraduate and graduate students, however, opposed the resolution because they said it would decrease their voice in the admissions process. Both Dean of Admissions Willis Stetson and Director of Financial Aid William Schilling addressed Council, saying they had mixed emotions about what should happen to the committee. They said they enjoy the feedback they receive from the student representatives but that an extra time committment is involved in preparing to attend two different sets of meetings.