At Seton Hall, Public Safety provides the SHUFLY and SafeRide services daily to bring students to where they need to go around South Orange and beyond.
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The SHUFLY is a free service that transports students to various locations throughout South Orange. These include stops on campus, along South Orange Avenue and Valley Street, RiteAid, South Orange Train Station, Ora Manor and Stop & Shop. On Saturdays, the SHUFLY travels to the Livingston Mall and makes trips to Target on Sundays.
The service runs from 6 a.m. to 3 a.m. on weekdays, noon to 3 a.m. on Saturdays and 11:30 a.m. to 3 a.m. on Sundays.
Students must have their Seton Hall ID and guests can ride if they are with a student. The SHUFLY arrives about every half hour and the schedule can be found on the Seton Hall website.
Many students use the SHUFLY service when it is too cold or their destination is too far away. Samantha Innamorato, a junior visual and sound media major, is one of them.
“I think the SHUFLY is a good resource to have on campus and is relatively efficient as it runs on schedule for the most part,” Innamorato said.
Another transportation service that Seton Hall offers is SafeRide.
Pat Linfante, the associate vice president and director of Public Safety, said that the service is similar to Uber and that there is a service area where rides can be requested to and from locations within it. A map of the service area can be found on the SHU website.
SafeRide runs seven days a week from 5 p.m. to 3 a.m. To use this service, students must call Public Safety or use the TapRide mobile app, which allows students to request a ride, set the pick-up and drop-off locations and see the location of the driver. Similar to SHUFLY, students must have their Seton Hall ID and guests must be accompanied by a student.
Linfante said that safety is the primary reason for SHU’s transportation services.
“First, and most important, is the safety of our passengers,” he said. “With SHUFLY and SafeRide there is never a reason to walk alone, especially at night.”
Linfante added that most of the residents on campus are not allowed to have their cars and need this resource to get where they want to go.
While both of these services are widely used by students, many have called for the SHUFLY service to run more frequently and be more punctual.
Gabrielle Monbeck, a senior Spanish major, said that the service can arrive earlier or later than the time on the schedule and that, when it does, it becomes an inconvenience. Monbeck said she encourages students to speak up about these problems.
“If you have any complaints about the system don’t be afraid to voice them,” Monbeck said. “The SHUFLY is there for us and if we don’t say anything, nothing will change.”
Daniel D’Amico can be reached at daniel.damico@student.shu.edu.
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