Transportation near the University of Texas
The University of Texas (UT) at Austin has the 5th largest enrollment in the country, with over 50,000 students, including undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral students as well as 16,500 faculties. Consider the thousands of state employees that keep the university running, that is a lot of people requiring transportation in to, out of, and around this 423.5 acre campus. UT has a total of 1.438 acres if you count the J.J. Pickle Research Center in North Austin.
The main campus is located a mere ¼ mile from the State Capitol building and the many state office buildings that surround it. To get around the campus itself, students and faculty can utilize the six miles of underground tunnel system that connects all of the buildings on campus.
The Capitol Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Cap Metro) provides public transportation to the city and has a special bus line called the UT Shuttle System that gives an easy and free way for students, faculty, and staff to get to and from the UT campus. It is the largest university shuttle system in the country.
Besides the free shuttle system, Cap Metro offers standard bus service around the city. People going to the campus can ride the bus from the Austin’s outlying areas and transfer to the UT Shuttle system to get them to campus.
For getting around downtown near the campus and within the Capitol complex there is also another bus line called the Dillo that services just these areas and has stops throughout the downtown area and very near the campus itself.
Cap Metro has also recently opened a 32-mile commuter light rail system that brings passengers from the areas north of Austin to downtown. Expansion is planned to provide a way for commuters to get to downtown Austin from other outlying parts of Austin. Once downtown, commuters can again connect with Cap Metro’s regular bus lines or the UT Shuttle system to get to their campus destinations.
Air transportation in and out of Austin is through Austin-Bergstrom International Airport, which is about five miles southeast of the city itself and 12.5 miles from the University.