Now is as good of a time as ever to take advantage of the Isabella County Transportation Commission’s services.

With gas prices continuing their rise and traffic congestion around campus and Mission Street at its usual high, the ICTC bus service is a commodity that grows in convenience every year.

And we applaud it for keeping up with the times.

The ICTC, founded in 1977, only provided shuttle service to Tallgrass, the Village at Bluegrass and University Meadows in 2004-05. Now it contracts with nine different apartment complexes in Mount Pleasant.

Copper Beech and Jamestown added the service in 2005; Deerfield Village, Lexington Ridge and Union Square signed on during fall 2006; and West Point Village joined in January 2007.

Even CMU is helping expand the service this year. The Public Relations and Marketing Department is funding the installation of six ICTC shuttle bus shelters, which will cost $46,370, around campus residence halls and complexes.

These additions will go a long way in sustaining the campus and keeping the roads and parking lots from congesting with cars and trucks. All the service needs is more students who live in off-campus complexes to pick up on it.

But for the most part, they have. The ICTC recorded a total of 155,717 riders during the 2007-08 year, said Dennis Adams, ICTC director of marketing and public relations, compared with approximately 12,700 during the 2004-05 academic year.

That’s an increase of more than tenfold for ICTC – and for excellent reasons. Even besides the fact that it’s environmentally safer and provides an alternative for students to avoid the gas pumps, the shuttle service keeps campus clear.

It does not take forever for commuters to get on campus and find a parking spot, especially during class hours.

If you are a student, consider your options. You might have to coordinate your time with getting to the bus stops to and from class, but that’s just about your only inconvenience.

Plus, you are doing your part in keeping your car from burning gas and further complicating traffic on the campus streets.

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