Faculty, staff enjoy the opporunity to “go green”

September 10, 2008
By Greta Myers
Staff Writer

The bike route that Rose Schweikhart Cranson takes from her home near the Dana-Thomas House to the UIS campus is not drawn on any map. The 30 minute, 6 mile ride has Cranson, a part-time Masters student in Public Administration and Assistant to the Dean of Public Affairs, and her hybrid Trek bike shooting down 4th Street and winding behind County Market. “I was going for the fastest, easiest and safest way,” Cranson said.

To participate in the program, staff and faculty need to register at the Recreation Sports Office, Room 1008, in TRAC. Participants can gain entrance to the locker rooms by swiping their ID cards. Though this program is aimed at UIS’s faculty and staff, students are encouraged to bike to, and around, campus as well. Safer bike routes and cycling tips for the Springfield area are available at: www.spfldcycling.org.

Although taking this route means she must carry her bike over a railroad barrier at one point during the trip, Cranson spoke enthusiastically about the environmental and health benefits of bike commuting. “You kind of have a heightened awareness of what’s going on and you meet more people,” she said.

Cranson became interested in biking to work after living in England. During her stay in the country, she used a bike and a bus as her primary means of transportation. Since getting her bike in May, she now bikes to UIS four days a week. Because faculty and staff (as well as part-time and strictly on-line students) only have use of TRAC’s showers with a paid membership, Cranson changes into her work clothes in a campus restroom.

A group of at least 15 UIS faculty and staff share Cranson’s love for bike commuting. Emails between the cyclists, Wes Weisenburn, Director of Human Resources, and Ed Wojcicki, Associate Chancellor for Constituent Relations, led to a plan to open the locker rooms near the gym in the Student Life Building.

“It is good use of space no one is using,” said Cranson, “It also fits in with the wellness plan that Human Resources was developing.” The official endorsements from faculty and staff groups, the Academic Professional Advisory Committee, and the Civil Service Advisory Council gave added support to the plan. Faculty and staff who bike to work are able to use the shower and lockers in the SLB.

Cranson is currently working on a letter with Heather Bailey, Associate Professor of History, and Marc Klingshirn, Associate Professor of Inorganic Chemistry, aimed to encourage Mayor Tim Davlin into making safe and defined bike routes to the university.

“So many students and staff come here. We need a bike plan,” Cranson said. She also said that being bike friendly is a good way for the city to illustrate its recently earned label as a ‘green city.’

“We need a fundamental shift in how people think about biking,” Cranson said, citing the Wabash bike trail’s purely recreational function. But whatever the reason people have for biking, said Cranson, it should be encouraged. “It is possible to get around on a bike. People don’t even think about that.”