Free Ride

New York City schoolkids take the buses and subway for free. A popular petition demands the same for college students.At a school full of commuters like ours, bus and subway fare can add up. With room and board, utilities, books and tuition, buying a Metrocard a major expense.An online petition on change.org is asking students to fight back and demand full fare Metrocards, just like New York City schoolchildren get. Started by New Yorker Imani McClure, the petition already has over 12,000 supporters.“College kids are students too!” it reads. “New York City is one of the most expensive cities to live in the world and it has the greatest number of college students in the United States (594,000 university students in NYC according to NY A Profile from Census 2000). That’s a lot of students paying for tuition, books, and supplies, in addition to groceries, transportation, rent and personal expenses and funding is decreasing every year!”Not surprisingly, CCNY students agree.  “I sometimes miss school because I don’t have enough money to get there,”says Stephan Francis, from the Bronx.Others would gladly stop paying $2.50 per bus or train ride. “I think full fare metro cards would help out the average college students a lot, in more ways than one,” says music major Ariel Yuen, who commutes from Brooklyn, New York. “I think that would be awesome because a lot of students are working part time jobs just to make a living and pay for school. It gets tough juggling the two especially when students have other things going on in their lives."He adds: "It sucks when students have to decide on whats more important because an unlimited metro is really expensive now a days and the only way to pay that off on top of living expenses is to put in more hours at work, which also takes away hours that could be used for studying.”