(Courtesy: Mike Harris)
Construction on a new parking garage behind Kincannon residence hall is scheduled to break ground in May.
The seven-level parking structure, which will contain 1,527 new parking spaces for students living in residential areas on campus, will open in August 2017. Students will now have the option of regular parking spaces available as well as the parking garage for the same cost.
Director of Parking and Transportation Mike Harris said one of the biggest issues on campus is residential parking, and the new parking garage will help to alleviate that problem
“When I first arrived here two years ago, one of the questions asked of me in the interviews was what did I see as one of the main issues on campus… and I saw residential [parking] as being the number one priority,” Harris said. “We’re building residence halls, but we’re not building parking, and to me that just seemed a little out of kilter.”
Now, with two new residential halls opening in fall 2016, more students than ever will purchase permits for Park-N-Ride lots, which could prevent them from keeping their cars on campus.
“I know a lot of folks say ‘I have nowhere to park,’ but I would be willing to show people everyday where there are places to park,” Harris said. “It may not be as convenient as they would like, but that’s a different question.”
In the past, the process of purchasing permits created a frenzy as students vied for coveted on-campus spots. Harris, however, said he is confident that by fall 2017 this will no longer be an issue.
“Once we get the garage built, we won’t sell out of residential permits because we will have the capacity, and we haven’t had that before,” Harris said.
The new garage is only one part of what campus architect Ian Banner calls a “master plan” to improve current structures and build new structures on campus, including parking.
“The question is, how do we provide the space that everybody needs without disrupting the university experience?” Banner said.
Unfortunately, the much-needed space is limited and in high demand.
“We are obviously going to be looking at [adding] additional parking garages, but we only have so many acres on this campus,” Harris said. “You start looking at the priorities of using that land, and when it comes down to building a classroom building, or an administration building, or building a parking lot, I can tell you the parking lot usually loses.”
According to Banner, the University has more parking spaces per person than many of its comparable universities and a lower cost for permits.
For every 100 permits sold on campus, there are 79 parking spots available. Considering that many of these spots are filled by commuters who travel back and forth to campus at different times, this is a relatively good ratio in comparison to surrounding universities.
For example, the University of Arkansas has only 66 spots for every 100 permits, the University of Tennessee has 70 and Oklahoma State University has 73.
Regardless, there are still some students who are unhappy with the parking situation on campus.
“It’s great they are making strides towards fixing the parking problem on campus, but personally I think the real problem is with commuter parking,” Erin Morris, a sophomore political science major, said. “Hopefully, giving commuters more places to park will be their next step.”
