On any given school day, you can see Tabor Academy students hustling from class to class. Most walk – or run, if they’re late – but as the weather starts to get cooler, students face the walk to their dorms, the Marine Science Center, the auditorium, and Dunkin’ Donuts or Cumberland Farms with dread. With rain plaguing the campus as of late, students are even more desperate for a quick way to get from place to place.
These desperate mid-day caffeine cravings and marine classes that meet just too far from the main academic building for comfort were fuel for a new idea: Community Bikes.
“After talking with a couple of my friends and a couple of faculty,” said Senior Class Co-President Khalida Williams, “we spoke with Mr. Winslow, Tabor’s CFO, to create a bike plan, kind of like citi-bike in major cities.”
“The idea is pretty simple,” added Co-President Theo Warren. “We have 20 bikes for all the Tabor kids to use as much or as little as they want.”
There will be bike racks set up all over campus from which students can take one of the bikes, bike to wherever they want to go, and then leave the bike at the rack there for someone else to grab.
The regulations on the bike use are mainly for safety reasons.
Students can’t cross Route 6 with the bikes, for example, but they are allowed to go as far as Dunkin’ Donuts or ride the other direction to lunch at a village restaurant or the General Store. The bikes can’t be used after dark either, and Plant Ops will lock them in their racks at 10:30 pm and will unlock them at 5:00 am to make sure they don’t get stolen overnight.
Each bike is equipped with a GPS locator, however, so in the unfortunate event of a theft or a lost bike, Tabor administration should be able to track it down. The only other restriction is during the winter months – once it starts snowing, the bikes will be stored away until spring.
The bikes will be introduced in the coming weeks, and Warren hopes that the Tabor community will make the most out of the new system.
“The bikes are there to make our lives easier,” said Warren, “and this is a trial run to see how well we can take care of them. If all goes well, we’ll get more bikes and have bike racks at every dorm.”
Williams is optimistic too, thinking it’ll curb “the urge for students to ‘borrow’ personal bikes from each other,” an annoyance that occurred sometimes last spring.
“Also, it will create a positive bond between the students and the administration if they know they can trust us to use the bikes responsibly,” added Williams, “which I honestly believe students will.”
Everyone at Tabor is eagerly awaiting the arrival of the bikes, ready to see how the new addition fits into Tabor life.
By Madeleine Gregory