<p>You may picture yourself driving your beautiful, sparkling car through campus with the wind in your hair and your favorite tunes playing over the radio. While possible, especially in warmer climates, things will likely not be so dreamy. There are certain realities that go along with having a car at college, assuming the school even allows you to have one at all. A recent story from U.S.News outlines five questions you need to ask yourself before deciding if you want the extra responsibility of a vehicle on campus.</p>
<p>If I had a car I probably wouldn’t use it to go to class, at least during the regular semesters. There’s a campus shuttle a stone’s throw from my house that comes every 25 minutes and runs well into the night, perfect for me. Parking can be expensive and you generally get shafted in parking lot selection until you’re a senior. If you live off-campus then it’s a little cheaper unless you live in certain apartment buildings that have direct bus service to and from campus, in which case you have to pay a big surcharge. People were ****ed about that but it makes sense; parking is limited as it is and if people have reliable alternative transportation options then they ought to be using those in order to alleviate congestion.</p>
<p>I’d definitely have it around though. Right now I have to borrow a roommate’s car. I’m very grateful that she let me borrow it before she even got to know me. I return the favor by fueling it up now and then (I just use it to buy groceries and occasional errands). It works, but unfortunately her car isn’t always available. I also love going on drives just for the sake of driving, so it’d be getting a lot of use through that. Nothing like waking up on a crisp Autumn morning and putting a few miles on the engine. I’m not so sure that I’d let people drive my car either, not unless my insurance covered it. </p>
<p>One way of getting around that last bit is to drive a manual… most people don’t know how to drive them ;)</p>
<p>I already know mine’s going to stay parked most of the time. There’s a fairly decent bus network around town where I’m going, the downtown area is right next to campus, traffic sucks, and plus the freshman lot is a sattalite lot a mile and a half away from campus.</p>
<p>My philosophy for giving rides is that if it’s somewhere I was already headed, it’s cool for you to tag along. Carpool and save the environment and all that. But if I’m going out of my way at your behest, I want some monetary compensation. Sorry, dude, gas costs money and I don’t have much in the way of money. And I don’t trust people driving my car, NO way. It’s a manual, so it isn’t easy to drive. Other people probably won’t do the things I do to save gas, leaving me with a more empty tank. Plus I like my seat and stereo adjusted in a specific way, and I don’t like when that’s messed with. </p>
<p>Mostly it’s just going to be for when I go home for breaks because how else am I supposed to do it? Get picked up every time? It’ll be good to have it for when it’s needed, but I’m not planning on needing it much. I’m also planning on bring my bike (it’s a very bike friendly campus, plenty of racks around)</p>
<p>You couldn’t get me to have a car at school. I’ve seen how bad the parking lots at my school become (i’m not kiding, its like vultures circling around a chunk of meat). i have two feet or a shuttle if i need to use it.</p>
<p>If your school doesn’t already sponsor it, you should get students organized to have the school sponsor ZipCar rentals from campus. My student signed onto ZipCar at Brown for a nominal fee, and while the free bus pass is the best deal, the Zip Car is great for places the bus just doesn’t work for, and the hourly rental works just fine. It is certainly cheaper than parking fees, and that doesn’t even include the cost of gas, possible extra insurance etc of having your own car. (and someone else takes care of repairs, shoveling the snow out of the way etc.) When taking others along it is easier to request they chip in also since they know you are renting.</p>
<p>I have a huge issue with this. I mean, getting around won’t be a problem. NYC has plenty of transportation options, so I’m not worried about that. But I live far away, so when I go home for breaks, the gas consumption will be ridiculous. It’s about a 6 hour drive to NYC from where I live. That’s 12 hours of my mom driving, 4 times a year. It will definitely inconvenience her as she’ll have to take substantial amounts of time off of work for that, because she can’t do it all in one day. But at the same time, my car (which has yet to be purchased) will by no means be a nice enough car to guarantee that it wouldn’t break down on a drive like that. Not to mention that parking is probably terrible. I’m really not sure what to do. Neither option really seems practical.</p>
<p>I’ve had a car since freshmen year. When I lived on campus, it stayed parked in the parking lot almost a mile away because that’s where it was supposed to be. Can’t drive around campus really. </p>
<p>The only time people asked me for rides is in emergency situations (drove a few friends to urgent care). Otherwise, they knew I wouldn’t do it. </p>
<p>I’ve always had off-campus jobs so the car was a necessity.</p>
<p>Rent a car. Have you even considered the costs and hassle of keeping a car in the city? The insurance alone will dwarf the costs of renting, let alone the amount of weather beating it would take if you parked on the street (making it even less reliable for those long drives). Or having to deal with alternate side parking…</p>
<p>You can’t rent a car until you’re 20-something. And not everywhere participates in Zipcar. Even with zipcar, you need to be 21+ unless you’re on/near a participating campus. </p>
<p>I go to a school in an urban setting in the west, where things are extremely spaced out. My parents live about 20 minutes by car from campus, but I wanted the freshman experience, so I lived on campus my freshman year. I brought my car with me because it was convenient for me to have that sort of freedom. Parking is expensive but not crazy, and the only time I have anyone else drive my car is when I need a DD. I drive my friends around sometimes, but usually only to places I was going to go anyway, and we tend to trade off rides since most of my friends also have cars on campus. For me bringing my car was a good decision, but if you’re going to be more inconvenienced by it, then by all means, don’t bring your car. It should be fairly straightforward in that regard.</p>
<p>S will not be bringing a car to his freshman year at college in the fall. We don’t have a “spare” car, and he is choosing to save his summer earnings for living expenses during the year.</p>
<p>His school doesn’t forbid freshman cars, but it’s a residential school, on-campus parking is at a premium, and they don’t make it easy for students to have a car on campus. The school has a bus to a major shopping area, and there’s ample “quick” shopping that’s walking distance from the campus. Unless he has a sudden, emergency need for an Orange Julius or something, it should be possible for him to schedule his mall trips using the shuttle.</p>
<p>The school is about 3 hours away from us, which was a factor in the decision tree, we had to think about how he was going to get back and forth between home and school. But it’s possible to use public transit to get back and forth, and the cost of a couple of round-trip tickets on Amtrak is less than the parking and car maintenance costs. It’s not a quick trip, but that will discourage frequent trips home on the weekend. :)</p>
<p>I guess we’ll see how it goes, we could decide after this next year that he really does need a car. In which case he will need to save up his money and buy one himself.</p>
<p>Actually, if you’re going to be in NY, it’s one of the few states that allow 18 year olds to rent cars, although there will be a substantial fee (the car would probably cost $100+ a day).</p>
<p>Hertz rents to under-25s now. There’s an extra fee but I had it taken off because they were doing a promo specifically targeted at under-25s who needed to get home from college for the holidays. It was like $130 for two days.</p>
<p>NY requires rental agencies to rent to 18 year olds. There’s a fee attached, but it would still be well worth it. If it’s a long stay just do a one-way rental.</p>
<p>TheKillerrAnna: Many kids at my school (in the midwest, not NYC) take buses home. Not city buses, fancier ones, like greyhound buses. If you live near a large city that’s closer, maybe 1 or 2 hours away, you could save your mom some time by buying a bus ticket, taking the bus for a few hours, and then having your mom drive to the closer city and pick you up. Or a train too, if that works better.</p>
<p>I brought a car with me to school and it got pretty annoying. My friends would get too comfortable asking me for rides to the supermarket, CVS, etc… or even across campus. I’d say no quite a lot since it got to be too much, and that lead to some people getting mad at me lol. </p>
<p>The only good part of it was that everyone was overly generous with gas money. I enjoyed that part quite a bit haha</p>
<p>Couldn’t live without my car, but we have a suburban campus that requires a 20-30 minute walk to get to anything. Plus club activities, etc, often take me off campus.</p>
<p>But obviously doesn’t apply everywhere, probably would not be as useful at a big urban campus.</p>
<p>Plus, my car is 20 years old, even though it runs like new, I don’t care if it gets scratched, tapped, etc.</p>
<p>We are thinking about letting our S, a rising college junior, take our 16 y.o. truck back to school with him this year. I’m not fully on board with it, because from my perspective, not having a vehicle reduces or eliminates several forms of trouble he can get into. I’m not worried about him loaning it out, though - it has a standard transmission and kids just don’t learn how to drive those anymore!</p>
<p>I go to school in upstate NY, about 4 1/2 hours from home. I do not own a car (I’ve always borrowed a parent’s car when I needed it at home) and while I can see the benefits of having a car, there is enough infrastructure in my college town to justify not having one. Do I take a ride when its offered by one of my local friends with a car? Absolutely. It is more convenient. Do I need it? No, I can take the bus. To get home, I take Greyhound or Coach or whatever to NYC and take a train home from there. If I can catch a ride and carpool, I will, but the buses were my main way of getting home for two years. </p>
<p>And to the person who is contemplating getting a car for a NYC college, it’s not worth it. Take a bus from Port Authority home and back, unless it is absolutely a pain to get to a Greyhound station.</p>
<p>If you go to the University of Mississippi and you want to come home for fall break, etc., you must either depend on the kindness of others to get to nearest airport (70 miles away in Memphis) or pay for a very expensive cab ride. There is no shuttle or train or bus. At orientation, we heard “Oh, someone is always heading to Memphis - you can catch a ride” - and they do have an active ride board system - but this really does not sound like a system an incoming freshman can rely on. We’re letting our son bring a car to Ole Miss this fall.</p>