Vehicle taking basic route round university, American (7)
I believe the answer is:
autobus
'vehicle' is the definition.
'basic route round university american' is the wordplay.
'basic route' becomes 'atob' (a route from A to B is the most straightforward).
'round' means one lot of letters goes inside another.
'university' becomes 'u'.
'american' becomes 'us' (abbreviation for United States).
'atob' enclosing 'u' is 'autob'.
'autob'+'us'='AUTOBUS'
'taking' is the link.
(Other definitions for autobus that I've seen before include "What one might catch" , "People-carrier" .)