It’s a gorgeous campus and a small student body, close to a medium-sized city and several other schools. Guilford looked like a great combination: an intimate community on campus with downtown Greensboro nearby to see movies, meet students from other schools, or to eat dinner out. But I didn’t bring my car.

I left it at home on purpose, planning to walk to the grocery store and occasionally riding a bus into town. After a year, I’ve gotten quite familiar with the stores and restaurants in walking distance. I’ve also spent plenty of time talking my driving friends into taking me somewhere. No wonder first-years seem to do nothing but sit in their rooms and drink. Soda, I mean.

The campus tour that I took before applying pointed out that city busses stop right in front of the school. One route does, following Friendly Ave. past UNCG to the downtown bus depot. This bus runs between 5 a.m. and 7 p.m, awkward hours for college students, and pulls in next to Quaker Village roughly hourly – switching between 18, 40, and five minutes after the hour. A night route runs until 11 p.m., but it stops at Friendly Center. At least bring a friend to walk the three miles back after dark.

Routes to the rest of town get more complicated. Greensboro bus routes don’t often cross, so getting anywhere but Friendly Ave. from Guilford means riding a bus all the way to the depot, the switching busses. My roommate said a past trip to the Target shopping center was 30 minutes in the store and four and a half hours in transit.

The other option for getting around is a bike. I’d like to describe more about this choice but I’m from a small town and Greensboro streets scare me. If you are interested in finding out about Greensboro biking routes, write to the new bike co-op at [email protected], or watch the Buzz for group rides.

It’s strange to have almost no public transportation at a school that is so vocal about environmental responsibility. Ideally, the school would run a shuttle to Tate St., downtown, and a few other locations. Aside from the obvious fuel benefits, we would be able to use the UNCG and municipal library, to leave the campus for entertainment, and have safe transportation back to campus when we’re out at night.

My favorite times here have been inventing things to do with friends on campus, or going to campus events. Easy transportation is important to me, though, since I’d rather love our campus because it’s lively, rather than because I’m trapped here.