Garage parking spaces may go to those on waiting list

By Dave Stephens
Assistant Campus Editor

Melissa White is planning on sleeping in.

White, a senior in the School of Liberal Arts, said she and her roommate woke up an hour early on the first day of school so they could find a parking spot.

"When we got there every spot was open," said White. "It was a complete shock."

White said she estimates that three-fourths of the student spaces in the Grant Street Parking Garage are empty when she leaves the garage at 1:30 in the afternoon.

The parking spaces are empty, in part, as a change in the way student parking permits are sold. For this year, students who live outside a mile and a half from campus could have purchased garage-specific "C" parking permits or surface permits, which allow them to park in several outlying university parking lots.

A total of 1,400 garage-specific "C" permits were sold, and they sold out within two days. Students can still buy surface "C" parking permits, but spaces in some of the surface lots are getting harder to find.

"When I park in the lots, people are waiting to pull in to my spot as soon I’m pulling out," said Angela Pasyk, a junior in the School of Liberal Arts.

Mike Jasper, Parking Facilities manager, said the parking situation is being monitored daily and changes will be made as the need arises.

"Only about 70 percent of those who have applied for the garage permits have picked them up," said Jasper. "Not all of the students who can park in the garages are parking in the garages yet."

Jasper said the students still needing to pick up their parking permits will have until Sept. 4 to pick up their parking passes.

More garage specific "C" permits could go on sale in the future, said Jasper, but they would go to the more than 2,000 students on the garage permit waiting list.

Pasyk said that she would be willing to upgrade from a surface permit to a garage permit. She said the reason she didn’t try to purchase a garage permit this year was the cost.

Jasper said if a student on the waiting list currently has a "C" surface permit, which costs $30, they can upgrade to the "C" garage permit, which costs $72, for the price difference.

Jasper said they have also noticed the increased number of cars parking in the surface lots, but that the problem will be reduced when a new 600-space parking lot is built south of campus later this fall.

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CAMPUS DESK PHONE:
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Campus editor: Laura Pelner

Assistant campus editors: Kurt Esposito, Dave Stephens

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