Last spring, the Macalester crew team went to Texas for spring break, where team members were able to practice twice a day. This year the team spent their break on campus, where winter weather conditions made practicing even once a day a challenge. With new restrictions on van use this year, Texas was out of the question.

The college rents out vans for use by student groups. The vans seat 15, and the school previously permitted 15 people to ride in them. There is now a limit of nine passengers per van along with a maximum mileage of 800 miles roundtrip for fall break and 1,800 miles roundtrip for spring break. There had previously been no set mileage limits for spring break, though fall break already had the 800 mile limit.

The new regulations, according to Director of Security Terry Gorman, came as a response to a report distributed by the National Highway Traffic Safety Commission (NHTSA) on “The Rollover Propensity of Fifteen-Passenger Vans.” According to the study, the rollover ratio for vans with ten or more occupants is almost three times that of vehicles containing less than ten passengers.

Instead of eliminating the van program entirely, as some schools did, a committee on Motor Pool Regulations, which does not have any student representation, decided to tighten its restrictions.

“We’re really just concerned for the safety of the people,” Gorman said.

Yet for student groups that depend upon the use of vans for trips, the repercussions of the policy change have been “catastrophic,” as crew team president Dan Urevick-Ackelsburg ’03 said. Lowering the number of people allowed in a van makes it more expensive to transport the same number of people and the mileage restrictions eliminate once feasible destinations.

The Outing Club usually takes six trips to three different destinations over spring break, including one to Utah. This year, however, “we couldn’t make it anywhere warm,” said club president Michael Rieser ’03. As a result, Rieser said, “interest was way down.” The administration did suggest alternate modes of transportation, he said, but none were environmentally or economically plausible, particularly for a group that aims to provide opportunities for anyone who wants to participate.

Dylan Oakley ’02, a member of African Music Ensemble, which also uses the school’s vans, echoed Rieser’s view. “It’s just so environmentally irresponsible for a supposedly liberal school,” he said, referring to the increased number of vans that must be used with the new policy.

For the Ensemble the new regulations have brought up another problem: lack of trained van drivers. The Motor Pool Regulations require that all drivers be at least 19 years old and pass a training program and evaluation. With fewer students allowed per van and more vans necessary for travel, more authorized drivers are needed.

For the crew team, according to Urevick-Ackelsburg, the van policy has daily implications. For its regular practices, the team sometimes has to drive two vans to the river, which “seems unnecessary just to drive down Summit,” he said. The team sent a proposal to Terry Gorman requesting an exemption. An answer was never received, although Gorman said he remembered responding.

As for alternate transportation, a bus was impractical for getting around in Texas. According to Urevick-Ackelsburg, “there was no cheap way to get where we wanted to go. It just didn’t work.”

On March 5, MCSG passed a resolution recommending reconsideration of the policy. According to President Nick Berning ’02, it was not the passenger limit that they took issue with, but the mileage limit. “It seems like the group that came up with the van policy hasn’t really thought outside the box and looked at all the possibilities that are out there,” he said, suggesting stricter limits on daily travel and a more lenient overall mileage cap for spring break.

The resolution also objected to the fact that the new policy was designed by a committee without any student representatives and requested that in the future student involvement be sought out in decision-making.

MCSG sent the resolution to Gorman but has not received a response. Gorman acknowledged receipt of the resolution but said he was waiting until the new MCSG government was elected before he issued a response.