Last year, the ODE stated there were 1,500 parking spaces for students. Being a driver, I wondered where those spaces were because I didn’t see them when I was looking for a place to park.
During the winter break of 2001, with the parking map, I went out to count these supposed parking spaces. Including parking not on the map, and spaces at Autzen Stadium, there are 1,664 total student spaces. Keep in mind there will be at least five times this many parking permits sold — not very good odds — and all student parking is shared with faculty and staff. But faculty/staff lots are not accessible to students. Not to worry, it gets worse.
Upon closer inspection, let me point out some details in order to get a better feel for the parking situation. There are more than 100 spaces for disabled, reserved, service vehicle and some 24-minute limitations.
Outside the residence halls on Columbia Street and Moss Street (119 spaces), the spaces are used by the students living in the dorms. They’re not supposed to occupy a space on a permanent basis or even a 24-hour period, but rarely have I seen a vacant space.
There are a few student spaces across the Eugene Mill Race. How many students know that? Who do you think uses these? Faculty and staff. At a lot next to Looking Glass (41 spaces), more than 50 percent are reserved.
Another lot is on East 15th Avenue, next to the artificial turf field — don’t blink or you’ll miss it. There are supposed to be eight student spaces, according to the parking map. There are seven reserved and one disabled. Why is this called student parking?
Parking on University Street competes with events at Mac Court. Events take priority over students. Before an event, meters are covered to prevent parking a day or more before the event and a day or more after an event, leaving the space empty and unused. There are 87 student spaces along University Street and for them, or a big majority of them, to sit there unused when they are desperately needed doesn’t make sense.
Considering all this, spaces available to students amount to about 1,092. Public Safety’s parking philosophy has been that students only occupy a single space for a short time, then vacate, allowing someone else to use the space. Their philosophy doesn’t work when there are five times
the permits sold compared to the spaces available.
I live out of town and use a space from four to 12 hours per day. How many of those 1,092 spaces, do you think, will be used by people needing to be on campus all day or a large portion of the day? Maybe in 1988, people weren’t interested in a parking structure, but that was 14 years ago. I find it offensive that this school can’t bear to live without a new football stadium but is unable to find the funds for something as fundamentally basic as parking.
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Susan Johnson is a senior sociology major.