The University of Mississippi announced Thursday that the campus’ only free, safe ride option Rebel Ride has been indefinitely suspended from service. Rebel Ride is a shuttle service that transports students from campus to the Square Thursday through Saturday nights. The suspension comes just before LSU comes to town — one of the busiest weekends for campus and the city of Oxford each year.
“I don’t want to talk too much about it, but the suspension of our service was completely out of our control,” said Audie Branch, owner of Carbo Limo service, the company that runs Rebel Ride. “It’s extremely unfortunate and we sincerely apologize, but hopefully we can get it back running again really soon.”
Although Branch would not give a specific reason for the suspension, he did point out that the suspension is not a result of an accident and that Rebel Ride has not had one accident since its inception in 2003.
The news spread after the Department of Student Housing sent an email to campus residents informing them the shuttle was suspended indefinitely. The news spread quickly to students through social media — most of whom expressed their displeasure with the situation.
Associated Student Body President Gregory Alston also tweeted Thursday that he would look into the situation.
“This is a major concern of mine, and this has to be one of the university’s top priorities,” Alston told The Daily Mississippian Thursday. “We absolutely have to have a safe ride program in place. The timing of this is also unfortunate, since it’s LSU weekend with so many people on campus. We have four more home games after this one. We have to figure out a solution soon.”
Branch said his business will be in jeopardy if Rebel Ride does not resume service soon.
“I am most definitely losing money because of this,” Branch said. “If something isn’t revised fairly quickly, it’s going to put us out of business.”
