Travel Center opens today

Booking a trip to Europe might not seem as daunting to students
and faculty now that a new travel center has journeyed its way onto
the UCLA campus.

The STA Travel Center ““ a worldwide travel organization,
which provides discounts to students, teachers and staff ““
opens in Ackerman Student Union today.

Aeron Wilson, STA branch manager for UCLA, said the travel
center will be a balance between learning and exploring for the
UCLA community.

“It’s education through travel,” Wilson said.
“Having it in the student union is a perfect fit for
us.”

The Associated Students of UCLA signed a five-year lease
agreement with STA in hopes the center will generate more traffic
in the union, said ASUCLA Executive Director Pat Eastman.

“I think that they will be an exciting, vibrant place on
the A-level,” Eastman said.

In addition to providing student-priced tour packages to the
UCLA community, the center will also be selling travel-related
merchandise, Eastman said.

Student Union Director Jerry Mann also pointed out that students
who don’t usually go to Ackerman could drop in for the center
and end up lingering in the union.

“The student union needs to be a good mix of retail,
personal and recreational facilities,” Mann said. “I
think STA is a good mix of services that students will
frequent.”

For UCLA students who travel often, the STA center will be a
valuable addition to Ackerman.

Chao-Liang Lin, a fourth-year electrical engineering student who
often travels around the country, said the center can be a
convenient asset when organizing his travel plans.

“I usually use Triple AAA or the Internet. … The center
is another way to compare prices or find hotels now,” Lin
said.

Though STA also operates a center in Westwood, Wilson remains
unfazed by the close proximity of the two centers.

“They’re two different demographics. We’re
more student based,” Wilson said, adding that the Westwood
center is more accessible to the general public.

STA will be ASUCLA’s second attempt at maintaining a
travel center for the UCLA community.

The Graduate Students Association operated a small-scale travel
center in the union for several years before it closed down in the
1990s due to inadequate business, Mann said.

But ASUCLA is once again advocating a travel center because STA
is a worldwide, renowned agency, familiar with student unions and
the student marketplace, Mann said.

“We were looking for a tenant that would appear to have
financial resources necessary to survive in college
environments,” Mann said, pointing out that students tend to
travel more often during certain times of the year.

The center will be even more personalized to the UCLA community
because many of the employees will be UCLA alumni, Wilson said.

In addition to providing students with tour packages and
in-person travel advice, the center is filling in a year-long
vacancy left by the Moby Disc record store.

The music store, which sold new and used CDs and videos, shut
down after two years of business, leaving the space vacant for an
additional year.

ASUCLA received an offer from an Internet services company
““ which would have provided Internet gaming and conferencing
““ but the deal fell through because the start-up firm was
underfunded, Eastman said.

“We feel that the travel service is a much better fit for
the student union,” Eastman said.