April 29, 2008
NEWS BRIEFS
Public Safety buys scooters
Officer Larry Johnson rides one of Public Safety’s three new T3 scooters. The department purchased the battery-powered scooters in response to student requests that officer visibility on campus become more prevalent and that the department become more environmentally friendly.
“We had some student issues with visibility, particularly the Nebraska lot at night,” Chief Michael McNair said. “We wanted to do something to make the campus more green as other departments are being asked to do. One car we had was way up in years and ready to be replaced, so I did a cost study. We could get three T3s for the same price I would pay for the car. That solved all three of those problems with no additional cost to the university.”
In fact, the T3s will be more cost effective because they don’t use gas. They can travel up to 15 miles per hour, and already have come in handy. When an AU shuttle bus was involved in a traffic incident on Tenley Circle, an AU officer aboard a scooter was able to respond to the scene faster than Metropolitan Police Department officers, who were stuck in traffic, McNair said.
The scooters are the latest boon to a department that has been receiving plenty of accolades. AU received an “A” grade in a recent Reader’s Digest piece that evaluated the safest college campuses in the country.
