As students of UTD, we enjoy a whole host of privileges: a quality education, abhorrently priced food, and most importantly of all, a sometimes beautiful campus that always seems to be under construction. But what is a campus without campus transportation? Unfortunately, this school offers little to no intercampus transportation services to its students, which means it’s up to them to figure out how they’ll navigate through the tight squeeze of the SU ramp. Thankfully, I am here to save you all from yourselves and offer some much-needed advice on the fastest, coolest, and best ways to get to your classes without being murdered by oncoming traffic. From bikes to horses to Tobors(?), this transportation tier list is a guide for any UTD student’s survival!
WALKING
First off is the most basic way of getting around campus: walking! Now as a pedestrian on campus, you should be aware that you’re always vulnerable regardless of where you are or what you’re doing. Calmly meandering through the dreary architecture of the Founder’s buildings? Next thing you know, you’ve been hit by a bike. There is no advantage to walking around campus, as it takes forever to get anywhere through the outrageously crowded foot traffic, plus the constant threat of ending up in the emergency room paralyzed from the neck down after being run over by a manchild on an electric scooter. Instant D tier, no questions asked.
BIKING
Who’s on two wheels and about to give you major head trauma? This guy! Now I have to admit, I may be a little biased seeing as I enjoy biking around campus quite a bit. However, it does not detract from the fact that biking is by far one of the most effective methods of movement on campus. When you ride on the roads, the crowds part like the Red Sea to let you pass. Bikes rule all; there’s no person or terrain that they cannot go around or through, and anything that tries to stop them will NOT fare well. Unless it’s a solid wall or another biker, in that case the rider will NOT fare well. Other than that, this earns an easy spot in the A tier.
SKATING
I have to admit, despite the fact that they’re immensely difficult to use, skateboards ARE pretty cool. This was originally an opinion everyone in the alternative scene was trying to convince people of back in the early 2000s, and the Thrasher-wearing folk got their wish because now every person that considers themselves too cool™ to ride a bike gets a skateboard. What most of these people fail to consider, however, is that riding a skateboard is HARD. You have to be willing to ride through any and all cracks in the road, and actually being good isn’t that easy—it takes hours of practice to pull off just a single ollie. So to anyone that is absolutely CRACKED at skating, this goes in A tier. But for all those posers that just want to be a part of the Hot Topic subculture that they saw on TikTok, this goes in C tier.
SCOOTERS
I’ll be honest, scooters are stupid. There’s no other way of looking at it; they are simply so dumb that riding them negates any viability they may have had (which I’d like to note is not very much to begin with). You have to kick around just to get anywhere, and you have to do it constantly, so you just look like a dumb flywheel cap-wearing kid who looks like he probably ingests his own boogers. And if you own an electric scooter, sure you don’t look AS dumb, but you’re still looking like an idiot who is most likely going to run straight through someone and take out at least 50% of their flesh. F tier, I don’t even want to think about these dumb things.
CARS
One would expect cars to rank pretty high; after all, they’re by far the fastest way you can get around campus. However, when it comes to driving a car on campus, there are several problems—mainly that this is a college campus that students walk around on. The fact that people actually walk through and congregate in the streets of UTD means that driving will never reach its full potential unless the driver decides that they don’t really care about human lives and would rather reach class on time, which is understandable. I haven’t even brought up the biggest problem with driving: the additional minimum $150 you have to pay just to park on campus. Despite the fee, UTD parking may as well be Fury Road with how cutthroat people are in search of decent parking spots. This is by far the biggest hit-or-miss on the tier list, so it’s landing straight in the B tier.
HORSES?
Yeah, that’s right! I bet you didn’t see this coming! Now I understand if you’re wondering how the hell one even gets a horse on campus or if it’s even allowed. I’m here to tell you that per the university’s student policies, Horses ARE ALLOWED as long as you tie up your horse outside the building you’re going into. As for how you get a horse onto campus, frankly that’s beyond me, but I’m sure the enlightened and intelligent readers of this article can figure that out. But is it even worth having a horse on campus? What can it offer that a bike or car can’t, besides the feeling of looking like an army general of years past? Simply put, owning a horse and riding it around campus sends a message to anyone in your way saying “stay out of my way or I will trample you to death,” which is pretty useful when you’re trying to get to class. This fits easily into the S tier.
TOBORS???
Tobor transportation is what all the cool kids are doing these days. The good thing about them is all the different ways you can get around in them! You could open up the storage compartment and squeeze in, grab three or four of them and start crowd surfing, or use two Tobors as roller skates. I’ve found that the best way to use Tobors is to tie them to my sled and use them as a crude recreation of Santa’s reindeer to assert that I am, in fact, the jolliest person on campus.
CONCLUSION
So now that the list is complete, all that’s left to do is decide the best mode of transit on campus. It could be bikes, but what else would be the best way to potentially endanger people’s lives? With a parking pass and the perk of not giving a damn, you could park anywhere and your life would be infinitely easier. But what about the Tobors and the horses? What’s truly the best way to get around this godforsaken campus!?
And that’s when it hit me: you don’t choose the mode of transport—the mode of transport chooses you. Some people are built to get into close calls with others while riding on their bikes and being insensitive jackasses. Others drive because they’re simply built to yell at pedestrians and lose themselves in road rage. And most people are satisfied with just walking. At the end of the day, the only way to know how you can get around… lies in your heart.
