University of California, Davis
ER-T2-5: Sustainable Enterprise

Founded in 1968, Unitrans is a unit of ASUCD which operates the transit system serving the UC Davis campus and the entire City of Davis. Approximately 250 students are employed, filling all the operational positions (driver, supervisor, dispatcher, trainer), as well as numerous positions in maintenance, administration, and management. Service is provided on 49 buses fueled primarily by compressed natural gas, and most doubledecker buses using biodiesel fuel. Over 21,000 passengers are carried each weekday, and over 3.6 million per year. Students gain tremendous experience relating to many aspects of sustainability in working at Unitrans. The entire enterprise is devoted to providing a more sustainable means of transporting thousands of people each day by using the bus instead of a car. They see directly the challenges in providing service that is convenient and accessible to the community. Maintenance staff is constantly looking at ways to save fuel and reduce use of materials. The ultimate sustainable statement is the continued use of vintage buses which were first built in the 1940s/50s and have been converted to clean diesel or CNG -- allowing them to continue in service rather than having to buy an entirely new vehicle. The Associated Students--UC Davis, Coffee House is a $4M, multi-platform, break-even operation staffed by 5 full-time and career employees, a handful of student managers, and over 250 student employees. There are seven different service platforms, including a bakery, pizza servery, deli, tex-mex grill, build-to-order salad station and a home-style foods venue. Aggie ReStore was inspired by the work of Design professor Ann Savageau who collects campus and community waste for use by students in her sustainable design class. Over the last couple of years Professor Savageau has found the amount of materials overwhelming but their creative reuse potential limitless. The graduate students that started the Aggie ReStore hope that salvaging some of these items from the trash will benefit people affected by rising tuition and living costs while also supporting Professor Savageau’s original mission to spread environmental awareness through creative reuse. Davis Net Impact offers networking and educational opportunities every quarter that bring together current and past classmates while encouraging community involvement. From sustainable business symposia to “day on the job” events, and from community volunteering events to the annual welcome retreat, Davis Net Impact provides members and the GSM community with a wide variety of engaging events every quarter. The Pantry is a food bank for UC Davis students which aims to prevent students from having access to basic necessities, including food and toiletries, due to financial constraints. UC Davis Student Farm is an educational site that includes the Ecological Garden and the Market Garden. The Ecological Garden mainly brings in elementary or middle school students that learn about their food, and UC Davis students and interns that learn how to maintain a garden, fruit trees, and chickens. The Market Garden has a certified organic CSA (community-supported agriculture) basket year-round for UC Davis students, staff, and faculty. Currently, 70 subscribers pay $21/week for a basket every week full of produce grown here at the Market Garden. The Market Garden has also recently been selling more produce to the Dining Commons (mainly Cuarto, who buys around $200 worth of produce/week) and the UC Davis Farmers' Market. Next year, the Market Garden plans to expand past the current 4.5 acres to better accommodate the requests from UC Davis Dining Service. In addition to providing delicious and local produce to the UC Davis community, the Market Garden allows for students and interns to learn about sustainable agriculture as they help harvest vegetables, set up irrigation, sow seeds, and transplant plants. Project Compost is a student-run organization under ASUCD that teaches people how to compost through quarterly workshops and tabling events. In addition, Project Compost picks up some of the organic waste from campus, including kitchen scraps from the CoHo, fruit from pomology labs, and plant matter from greenhouses, and compost it here on campus (as opposed to having it trucked out of town). Student volunteers help maintain the compost pile, and finished compost is used by local gardeners, such as those in the Domes, Experimental College gardens, or the Tri Co-ops. Further information can be found at: https://sites.google.com/site/gsmnetimpact/ http://studentfarm.ucdavis.edu/market-garden http://projectcompost.ucdavis.edu/ http://coffeehouse.ucdavis.edu/local