Peter Vomocil has spent up to 30 minutes driving around campus in search of a parking spot and said he views other cars as “vultures” he has to fight off.
Although Vomocil, a junior theater arts major, spends about $80 a term for a parking permit, some days he’s forced to find a metered spot. And even then, he sometimes ends up losing out, either because space is limited or he’s ticketed for parking illegally or letting the meter run out.
“Parking is cutthroat on this campus,” he said.
Vomocil is not the only critic of University parking.
The Department of Public Safety gives out about 6,000 parking permits throughout the year, although there are only about 3,200 spots available at one time. This includes the nearly 500 metered spots on campus, which doesn’t always accommodate everyone who drives to school.
Rand Stamm, DPS parking and transportation manager, said DPS collects about $25,000 to $40,000 a year from citations, with overtime meters probably responsible for the bulk of the fines.
With such limited parking space, many students choose to avoid the parking war and find alternative ways to get to class, which has been encouraged by DPS.
Stamm said that because of people’s different schedules, “there’s almost always some open spaces anytime of the day,” but some spots are farther away, and students fight for closer spaces.
Stamm added that driving to school isn’t always the most reasonable mode of transportation anyway.
“With such a tremendous population density on campus, it makes much more sense economically and environmentally for people to use alternative means of transportation,” he said.
Junior psychology major Sarabeth Leitch, who lives about 13 blocks away from campus and isn’t close to a bus line that runs regularly, normally rides her bike to school to steer clear of parking chaos.
“Biking takes so much less time than finding a place to park,” she said.
Leitch sometimes drives when she has to go to school directly from work, but even on those days she tries to find a two-hour parking spot on a street, which has its own inconveniences.
“It’s all about luck,” she said of finding a place to park off-campus. “And I’ve also left class early to move my car because I didn’t want to get a ticket.”
But when students get desperate to find a spot quickly in order to avoid being late to an exam or missing a class, parking illegally is sometimes the lesser of two evils.
Vomocil, who said he has spent almost $55 in parking fines in the past two weeks, said one of his biggest arguments is that some meters only allow 45-minute or 1-hour parking, which sometimes isn’t even sufficient for one class period.
“There are days I’m willing to park illegally just to get a spot,” he said.
Stamm added that one option many students don’t know about is auto-park, a small electronic device that allows students to pre-pay for meter spots at a 5 percent discount. Students can purchase an auto-park pass at the DPS office.
Although some students may wish the University would offer parking spaces at no cost, Stamm said there’s no such thing as “free” parking because all lots have maintenance expenses, which are paid for mainly by meters, permits and citations. He added that the University had considered building a parking garage years ago but received too much public opposition.
But some students say that even if more parking spaces were available, they’d choose other alternatives because it’s not worth the associated costs. Junior psychology major Laura Shula said that she’d still walk to school to avoid the trouble.
“It’s a hassle to find parking, and I’m a poor college student,” she said.
Stamm added that no matter how many parking spots are added, people will perceive parking to be a problem because available spaces won’t be in desired locations.
“There’s a joke that no one will be happy until everybody can park right in front of the building they need to go to,” he said. “You can never make everyone happy.”