UBC Reports | Vol. 47 | No. 08 | Apr. 19, 2001

Headliners

Tranquilility of a transit strike

The Vancouver Sun, April 5, B5

Out at the University of B.C., Gordon Lovegrove is surprised. Lovegrove, the director of transportation planning, predicted Tuesday would be the busiest day for traffic out to the Point Grey campus, one of the top three commuter destinations.

It didn't happen.

"It has caught me off-guard," he said. "I'm amazed at how well people are handling this."

He cited an e-mail survey of 35,000 students, staff and faculty that showed 45 per cent of respondents felt they lived close enough to walk or bike to campus.

"A lot more people are walking and getting on their bike than we anticipated," he said.

Women embrace law

The Province, April 8, A24

Reports that women are crossing the 50 per cent enrolment mark in American law schools have Canadian administrators wondering what took them so long to catch up.

"That bench-mark was surpassed here a decade ago," says UBC law professor Elizabeth Edinger. "We've been like this for at least 10 years. We're at 56 per cent women this year."

"Our incoming class of 2001 has 67 women and 38 men. That's a pretty impressive statistic," says Yvonne Lawson, the law faculty's career development officer.

Going green

CAUT Bulletin, April, Feature

The UBC campus has saved more than 900 trees in the year 2000 by using recycled paper.

Environmental considerations have even influenced the design and construction of buildings.

Freda Pagani, UBC's sustainablity director, is proud of the progress. Though she still sees room for improvement, she says it's important for universities to take a stand.

"If a university can't start acting sustainably, how can we expect other institutions to?"

Asked what she would say to a university that is reluctant to set up a sustainability program, she answers, "Why would you not? You can save money, you can have fun, you can build community and you can help save the environment. It's a bit of a no-brainer to me."