It's early Friday morning and the last Loop bus passes -- meaning another hike to the north side of campus in the cold.

The Loop bus service stops operating at 2:30 a.m. on Friday, Saturday and Sunday mornings, after nights when students are often out late. Some students think Centre Area Transportation Authority (CATA) should consider increasing the buses' hours on those nights to accommodate students.

"It would be a lot of money. We might consider it if we knew where the money was coming from or if a need was seen," said Teresa Davis, Penn State director of transportation services. "We are currently paying about $1.4 to $1.5 million for transportation services on campus."

Even though tuition is on the rise, students can't agree on whether a bigger bill is worth a few extra hours of bus service.

Michael Myerson (freshman-accounting) said having continuous bus service would be convenient on the weekends and is worth paying a higher tuition bill.

"I'd like to see some of these bus drivers walk back to East Halls at 2:45 in the morning, cold after having a good time in town," Jeremy Durkin (freshman-liberal arts) said.

But he said he is already strapped for cash and cannot afford the extra fee for service.

It's not unusual for a party to last until the morning, but those who miss catching the bus are not forced to walk home late at night or to walk alone: They can use the taxi services in town or call the University Escort Service at 865-WALK to have someone walk with them.

Even though students may favor extra hours of bus service, Eric Bernier, Director of Service Development for CATA, said it would be difficult to convince CATA to run buses for longer on the weekends independently of Penn State. But, CATA would agree if the university was willing to provide funding for the additional hours, he said.

Before August 1999, there was a fare of 40 cents to ride the Loop. Students petitioned the university for free busing on campus.

The university then negotiated with CATA and developed a partnership in which the university pre-pays for bus service.

This past August, the contract was renewed for an additional three years. The university uses a portion of tuition, about $25 per student, to pay for the no-fare busing on campus.

"We tripled ridership when we got rid of the bus fare," Davis said. "Therefore, service was increased. Currently we are using CATA's equipment to the maximum."

When students paid for service per ride, the system was slow and ran inefficiently because of the time it took for each student to deposit money.

"It would be our preference to negotiate a plan with Penn State rather than run independently, because of the problems associated with collecting fares," Bernier said.

"Also, we do not want to support partying 24 hours a day."

CATA recently traded early Saturday morning service for service in the early morning hours after Thursday nights. Bernier said that when the weather is extremely cold, raining or snowing, CATA increases bus numbers on an as-needed basis to accommodate the increased number of students traveling by bus.