Olympia, Granby Mills residents short-changed
Resident or guest, if you plan on parking at the Olympia and Granby Mills apartment complexes, you will need to arrive early. In preparation for the construction of a new apartment building, the complex has closed off its expansive front parking lot, forcing residents to make use of the lots previously allocated for guest parking. Yet while the complex has reduced guest parking, the closing of the front lot has resulted in notable parking shortage for residents, a problem that will not disappear any time soon.
Residents were first notified about the closing of the front lot prior to the end of the fall semester, when literature was posted throughout the Olympia and Granby buildings. Despite the imminent construction of a new apartment building, Olympia and Granby made no effort to explain why the lot was being closed, or for how long, leading most residents to assume the lot was being closed for temporary maintenance. It was not until residents discovered a year-old article from The State, which detailed the development plans for the lot, that the truth was revealed.
Given the chronic parking shortage and the complete lack of notification, residents are now angry, rightfully so, with the complex. On the apartment buildings’ Facebook page, property manager Josh Harding assured residences that with the resumption of towing and the reduction of guest park spots, all residents would have a place to park. Yet by nine o’clock, all parking spots were full, and arriving residents were forced to either create their own parking spaces alongside curbs, or leave the parking lot altogether and risk being ticketed by parking on the street. Residents arriving later in the night are now forced to circle the parking lots hoping by some miracle to find an available spot, while residents who were lucky enough to find a spot earlier are now extremely hesitant to leave and risk losing their spot. And given the difficulties for residents trying to find a parking spot, guests stand almost no chance at being able to park at Olympia and Granby.
With the construction of additional residences without any apparent parking lot to accompany them, this problem will only be compounded in the future. While a parking spot should be a basic amenity at any apartment complex, that is no longer the case at Olympia and Granby Mills. Current residents are faced with the unnecessarily difficult task of finding even just an open curb to park alongside, and residents can also no longer expect to be able to invite guests over, unless those guests plan on walking. It is unclear whether Olympia and Granby Mills simply did not care about the repercussions of closing the complexes’ front parking lot, or whether it instead did not do its homework to ensure there were still enough available spots, but the complex has single-handedly changed parking from an afterthought into a major issue for those considering where to live next year. It seems the parking shortage is quickly becoming more than a campus issue.
Thomas White is a third-year business student.