The bollards intended to block vehicle access behind the Bell Center are still standing in spite of a November Assocation of Student Represenatatives  resolution that stipulated their removal, and they will remain there until the Facility Services Master Planning Committee meets in February.

“Those [bollards] were put up about a year ago. Initially, they were to block off that area for construction purposes because they were working on the power plant by the Bell Center,” said Sean Solis, ASR vice president and chair of the Parking and Traffic Committee. “Last semester, facility services decided to keep them up after the construction had finished, in order to safeguard pedestrians walking through that area.”

Solis, the author of the ASR resolution, thinks that the bollards are unnecessary and actually detrimental to the campus community, citing concerns about how they block vehicular access from the sophomore college on the west side of campus.

“Most students on campus would argue that it is kind of inconvenient if you’re trying to drive through,” Solis said.

Unfortunately for those who want to see the bollards gone, the ASR resolution that passed the Senate and the Parking and Traffic Committee is non-binding and does not require the campus administration to make a decision.

“We can’t force the administration to act on [the resolution], but it’s just there to show this is what the student body thinks about a particular issue. The administration can take it or leave it,” Solis said. “We would hope that they would take our advice into account but that’s not always the case.”

John Greene, director of campus planning and sustainability, favors the bollards as a way of making the campus more pedestrian friendly. He does not yet know what will happen to the bollards.

“That is an issue that is going to be reviewed by the Facilities Master Planning Committee,” Greene said. “That committee is scheduled to meet in February and [the issue of the bollards] will be one of the agenda items on there.”

It is likely that a determination will be made by the committee when it meets next month, according to Solis: “I think it’s all going to come down to that February vote in the Master Planning Committee.”

However, if anti-bollard forces on campus do not get their way, the issue might remain unresolved for the foreseeable future.

“If that [vote] doesn’t turn out [against the bollards], then the ASR would hope to have the students mobilize a little more on the issue,” Solis said.

The Trinitonian last ran an article about the bollards in the Nov. 2, 2012, issue, entitled “Poles block access, ASR resolves to have them removed.”