5/14 Weekly update: Travel and transportation considerations

Bottom Line, Up Front

  • Upcoming key dates or action items for families and/or students
  • Family Weekend football tickets go on sale May 21
  • Sign up to receive the Daily Deac blog (optional but recommended)
  • Travel considerations
  • We are a walkable campus – your student doesn’t *have* to have a car: we offer shuttles, Zipcars, and bike-sharing
  • Registering a car on campus
  • Airports and airport shuttles

Dear parents and families of incoming students,

Looking ahead to your Deacs’ arrival later this summer, today, we will focus on: 1) upcoming dates and deadlines, and 2) what you need to know about travel and transportation.

Upcoming key dates or action items for families and/or students

  • In these weekly messages, we will always begin with any upcoming key dates or action items for you or your students. Here are the ones you need to know within the next week or so:
  • Tickets for the Family Weekend football game(Sept. 28 against Louisiana) will go on sale on Tuesday, May 21 at 10 a.m. See full details and mark your calendar. 
    • NOTE: Students can get a free ticket to sit in the students’ football section with the Screamin’ Demon Rewards App (ticket claims open at noon the Monday before the game: Sept. 23 at noon ET). If your student wants to sit with you, you will need to purchase a ticket for your student.
  • Subscribe to the Daily Deac blog (optional but recommended): Have you discovered the Daily Deac? The Daily Deac is an opt-in blog that shares important news, offers advice about supporting your students, provides reminders of important deadlines, and covers a variety of WFU activities and events to help you get a sense of campus life. You can subscribe here. (Full disclosure: I author the Daily Deac :)).

Travel and transportation considerations

Here’s all you need to know about travel to and from Wake Forest:

We are a walkable campus and have shuttles – your student doesn’t *have* to have a car

  • Walkable campus: Wake Forest’s Reynolda Campus is extremely walkable and bikeable. All academic buildings and dining locations can be reached on foot from the first-year residence halls in about 10 minutes or less.
  • Shuttles: Wake Forest operates a fleet of scheduled shuttle lines in the center of campus and on-demand services to members of the campus community. Different shuttle lines will take students to parking, Hanes Mall, Target, various apartment complexes, Wake Downtown, and the Coliseum for men’s basketball games.
  • Zipcars: If your student doesn’t have a car (or you don’t want them to bring a car), we have you covered! Wake Forest has a car-sharing program called Zipcar that allows students to rent a car for hours or even a day. Zipcars are parked on campus near the first-year residence halls on Gulley Dr. They are available 24 hours a day. Rates include gas and insurance. Students can register here: Zipcar.
  • Bike-sharing: Don’t want to bring a bike to campus? Consider our ReCycle bike sharing program. If you do plan to bring a bike, be sure to bring a lock to secure your bike.

Registering a car on campus

  • For families who still decide to send a car to campus, first-year parking permits will be available online beginning August 1. Visit the parking website to purchase your parking permit, access the parking map, and become familiar with the parking rules and regulations.
  • All first-year and transfer students, including those who commute to campus, are required to park in a designated lot off campus. Shuttle service is provided.
  • Students with disabilities or health issues should refer to our disability services page for more information.

Airports and shuttles

Airports:

Shuttles

  • Important note: We do not offer shuttles to the Raleigh-Durham airport (RDU). For flights to/from the Raleigh-Durham airport, families can contact Black Tie Transportation, a for-hire car service.
  • When families ask me, I always tell them my preference as a student was to fly into Greensboro because it is so much easier to get to campus from Greensboro than from Charlotte or Raleigh. Even if the cost to fly into Charlotte or Raleigh is cheaper than Greensboro, the cost of ground transportation from Charlotte or Raleigh to Winston-Salem may eat up much of that ‘savings.’
  • Students who fly into Charlotte or Greensboro at a time when our shuttles are not running (or are fully booked), or fly into Raleigh-Durham, should plan to find alternative transportation back to campus. That might mean having a friend with a car drive them there/back or using a private car service like Black Tie Transportation, Uber, etc. Every family will need to make the choice that works for them.

Parting thoughts

We will continue sending weekly messages to our new P’28 and transfer families throughout the summer. In case you missed last week’s message, you can view our archive here.

With best wishes,

Betsy Chapman, Ph.D. (‘92, MA ‘94)
Executive Director of Family Communications

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