2008 Woodie Awards
SGA votes to examine the parking problems
Patrick Jobson
Issue date: 5/8/08 Section: News
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The SGA had many things on its table on what was going to be a long and heated meeting. After discussing public transportation with a representative of Addison County Transit Resources (ACTR) and accepting the Finance Committee's budget proposal, the SGA discussed the current issue of parking spaces on campus.
Currently, there are 555 junior and senior parking permits available, and only 441 open parking spaces. In addition to parking confusion, this created over $34,000 in parking ticket revenue in the 2006-2007 academic year. This revenue may be attributed to the inefficient allocation of parking spots.
According to Lisa Boudah, director of Public Safety, the number of parking permits does not accurately represent the quantity of cars actually on campus. Public Safety may "not follow each person well enough," said Boudah. "Some students come in the fall, leave in the winter and are still counted even if they are not here." Other miscalculations may be due to the fact that many students change their vehicles during the academic year and get a permit for both of them.
But SGA Senior Senator Ashwin Gargeya '08 said that "literally 110 juniors and seniors are playing musical chairs with the available parking spots." According to Gargeya and other members of the SGA, finding a spot to park is extremely challenging and time-consuming and the problem can be alleviated if parking spaces are better distributed.
According to the proposal presented to the Senate, the best solution is to reallocate the available parking spots so that the number of parking permits is closer to the number of available parking spaces. For example, there are 282 spots reserved for first-year students reserved at Kenyon Lot, while only 83 first-year parking permits have been handed out.
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