One of the biggest problems on this campus is parking. Students wear their parking tickets like battle scars in the constant fight for a decent spot, or a spot at all. While a large portion of the parking problem has to do with student culture, there are concrete things that the university can change to improve the situation, including limiting who can park on campus and giving students a shuttle system they can trust as much as their own car.
We go to school in a city. It’s nearly impossible to find places to squeeze parking spaces between all the buildings and businesses. No matter how much we complain to the university about parking, they cannot just create space out of nothing.
What could solve a lot of these parking predicaments is something that many universities have already implemented: not allowing freshmen to have cars on campus. As freshmen already have to live on campus and have a meal plan, there are few reasons a freshman would absolutely have to have a car to live on this campus.
College of Charleston, UNC Chapel Hill and many other universities have already implemented this parking plan for their large student bodies and limited parking areas, so why not here? While some freshmen might resent this change, the current parking problems cannot continue.
The forum about parking held for students in Russell House Monday night tried to address the ever-deteriorating situation with a “Master Plan” that is less of a plan and more of a goal to improve mobility on campus.
One of the issues students were most verbal about was the limited scope of the bus system. The buses don’t run at late hours for students studying or participating in clubs or other evening activities. Students also feel that they cannot depend on the bus system to be on time and get them where they need to go. When the bus system has such a bad reputation it is difficult to persuade students to forgo their own transportation for it.
Students can help with the issue by being conscious of their impact on the situation. And freshmen, if you leave your car in a garage for weeks at a time without moving it, you’re taking a space from someone trying to get to class. Only using your car to drive home for Thanksgiving isn't a reasonable excuse to take up everyone else's precious parking.