Students faced poorly lit walks up the hill after their evening workouts when the NightRide shuttle service from the IMA was discontinued at the end of spring quarter. The service was restored yesterday, but changes have been made to the overall program.

“We found an opportunity to reconfigure the zones for NightRide, and as a result of that, we could incorporate the IMA into the east loop,” said Josh Kavanagh, director of transportation services.

The IMA shuttle was originally a separate bus, funded by the ASUW, that took students to the Communications Building where they could transfer to east, west and north zone shuttles that transported students within a mile of campus.

When the ASUW could not sustain the program and several years of emergency funding ended, the loop was discontinued last spring. After changes to the program, however, the IMA has become a campus stop for the east zone shuttle.

As part of the alterations, the NightRide service area is now divided into two regions instead of three, and the program will run four shuttles instead of six.

“The overall service area has not changed at all,” Kavanagh said. “This is just a reconfiguration of the zones that the area is divided into to provide more cost-effective service.”

The shuttles are funded by the U-PASS program, and changes are estimated to reduce the cost of the service by $80,000 each year.

“Budget was certainly a very significant consideration in this,” Kavanagh said. “We considered both the ridership and the geography to make a decision that was going to work.”

To restore service to the IMA, transportation services will have the shuttles operate every 20 minutes instead of every 15, increasing the wait time for students.

“We believed that at 15-minute intervals, people were going to a stop and waiting instead of catching a specific shuttle,” Kavanagh said. “With the 20-minute shuttles, we are very hopeful that people will plan which shuttle to get on and will in fact be waiting less at the stops.”

This doesn’t provide much consolation to some students.

“Twenty minutes is kind of a long time to wait,” said graduate student and NightRide regular Sharon Chang as she waited for the shuttle. “The way it used to work last year was more beneficial to students.”

After requesting the original service to the IMA in 2005, members of the ASUW appear to see the increased wait time between shuttles as a reasonable solution.

“I feel that that’s a very easy compromise that we can make as students to save the IMA service,” said Tunny Vann, the ASUW director of community relations. “I think students can handle the five-minute difference.”

The new service runs until Dec. 17, and Meany Hall is the transfer point for IMA passengers to board the west shuttle. Stops for the shuttle also include the Communications Building, Garfield Lane, the HUB, and the flagpole.

Reach reporter Lexie Krell at news@dailyuw.com.