Wednesday, November 21, 2001

Froggie-Five-O not so safe
By Bethany McCormack
Skiff Staff

It’s dark and most of the campus is asleep. You are alone in the middle of the freshman parking lot. You hear a sound and jump. ‘What was that?’ you think. You hear it again and begin to panic.

Suddenly, out of the darkness approaches your savior. A vehicle screeches to a halt at your feet and a voice asks, “Need a lift?” You’re safe — for now, as you step into the golf-cart and smile gratefully at the student behind the wheel. Thanks Froggie-Five-0.

That is the ideal scenario for Froggie-Five-0, the safety escort program for students. However, reality is often quite different.

Students have abused the free rides to the point that it serves now as a chauffeur service. If you don’t feel like walking from your car, just hop on a golf-cart and you get to the dorm in no time. If you just spent a small fortune at Express, now you don’t have to tire your arms carrying those heavy bags.

Be honest for a minute. Does riding in a golf-cart with another student really make you feel safe? Unless that student has been trained in martial arts, which is unlikely, you really aren’t any safer riding in the little cart than you would be walking with another person.

Police escorts are a different matter. Police have received special police training, carry weapons and can make arrests. If you are riding with a police officer, then congratulations, you’re probably pretty safe. However, Froggie-Five-0 relies primarily on student drivers rather than police officers.

Froggie-Five-0 was created with good intentions. Crime Prevention Officer Pam Christian said in a Skiff article in August that the purpose of Froggie-Five-0 is “to ensure the safety of our females and also for the escorts to serve as extra eyes and ears for campus police.”

Designed to increase safety, now students are actually less safe walking on the sidewalk. They risk getting run over. When a golf-cart is delivering a student to their destination, all other pedestrians must watch out and get out of the way. Joggers with headphones on must keep an eye out for the lights or get run over. Isn’t the whole point of a sidewalk to keep you safe from vehicles?

Li Chauviere, junior theater major, said she feels the drivers often are reckless and unaware of pedestrians.

“I think that the Froggie-Five-0 drives too fast without regard to the safety of pedestrians. They weave in and out of people, and it’s not safe,” she said.

Chauviere said she was hit by one of the carts last year after briefly stepping off and then back onto the curb in front of Colby Hall.

“The windshield hit me in the left shoulder. The guy stopped a few yards ahead and came back apologizing. He said that he didn’t see me and didn’t know I was going to step up on the sidewalk. He was driving really fast though, because I’d only stepped off the sidewalk for a second when he was zooming past.”

If the safety of students is the primary concern of Froggie-Five-0, maybe the drivers should be as concerned for students on the sidewalk as they are for those in their golf carts. Although it would be slightly annoying, maybe the drivers should honk horns to alert pedestrians, similar to carts in airports.

The golf carts zip around campus with the purpose of protecting our “delicate” female students from the “bad guys” lurking out there. However, as it functions now Froggie-Five-0 is less protection than it is a chauffeur service.

Opinion editor Bethany McCormack is a junior English major from Dallas.
She can be contacted at (b.s.mccormack@student.tcu.edu).