By Alex Smith

To start off, I’d just like to say that I’m the first person to preach about all the great qualities of UB. It’s got a great student body, a large selection of classes, plenty of off-campus opportunities, and good food (with the exception of the Dining Halls, thank God for meal exchange!). But there’s one thing that I cannot stand, and that is the fact that some people just do not know how to walk properly. Yes I said walk, like the basic human function that most of us learned like twenty years ago. There isn’t a day that goes by where I have not been bumped into, knocked over, ran into, or been late to a class because of someone’s inability to walk. Therefore, I’ve decided to share a couple of my biggest pet peeves when it comes to people strutting the many halls of UB:

1. People that walk like they’ve just been placed into a vat of molasses. Please consider walking at a reasonable pace and if that’s too­­ difficult, keep to the sides of the walls so others can pass you. Nothing irks me more than a group of slow walkers talking up the majority of the hallway, allowing no one else to pass. It’s like being on the thruway: no one want’s to encounter the car that pulls out from the right lane, only to slow down in the passing lane. You do not want to be that car.
2. People who walk in large groups, and manage to take up the entire hallway. I’m pretty sure you and your friends can be separated for the 5 minutes that it takes you to get to class or back to the Union. If not, you must be a horribly clingy person.
3. People that read the paper while they walk. I’m pretty sure that’s what chairs and benches are for. This applies to all types of papers, whether it’s newspapers, tests, textbooks, notes, etc. In my opinion, there’s no worse walker than the student who just got out of a test and is frantically flipping through his or her notes and textbooks. If you really need to go through your notes after a test, wait until your home and in the privacy of your own room. Then you can cry and drown your sorrows in a bottle of Jose Cuervo, rather than in front of the entire UB population.
4. People that hold a full-fledged conversation in the middle of the hallway. This only creates more congestion when people are trying to make their way to classes. Save the conversation for lunch at Pistachio’s, while enjoying a nice bowl of Bravo Pasta. If you really need to talk to the person, just move to the sides of the hallways, allowing other people to pass you. Otherwise, a simple hello or slap-up should suffice.

By pointing some of these things out, I’m really hoping that students will become more aware of their surroundings, and realize that they are not the only people navigating their way around campus. There are currently over 20,000 undergraduates on campus, along with large numbers of graduate students, professors, and other campus employees. With this many people, accidents and large amounts of walking traffic are bound to happen, but I’m sure I’m not the only one sick of being knocked around and bumped into on a daily basis. So how about it UB, let’s give it another shot. If not we may see UB’s next greatest creation: UB Walking 101, and no, it would not be an easy A.