Have you ever gotten back to campus around midnight after hanging out with friends or working an off-campus job and it’s pouring? You pray to get a parking spot by your building so you don’t have to walk all the way across campus, but low and behold there are none. Parking on campus is awful and yet, they still are advertising students should come and live on campus.

Martin Hall, Elm Hall and Alumni Hall have nowhere near enough parking for the residents that live there. I’m not saying that you to account for spots for EVERY single person living in the building. There are plenty of people that do not bring their cars on campus and use the campus transportation and that is totally fine. However, if there is a residence hall that is as big as Alumni Hall or even Elm Hall, I feel that there should be sufficient parking for those residents, so they do not have to walk all the way across campus. For example, 1 spot per each room might be a solution to this issue. This is not as much of a problem for Elm since Elm is closer to a bigger parking lot. Even still, there are no paths straight to Elm. You have to walk through the woods that separate Elm from Parking Lot T. If you have groceries or it’s pouring rain and you don’t have an umbrella this can be frustrating.

Alumni Hall has nowhere near enough parking for those who live there. I am aware that there are not just freshmen living there. Certain upperclassmen are allowed to live there as well, and of course the Resident Assistants are not freshmen. However, there are how many rooms in Alumni hall? Too many to count, right? Yet there are maybe 40-60 spots around the building that you can park at. For someone who is coming back to campus late after working a long shift or even someone that was out and comes back to torrential downpours, students do not want to have to walk ALL the way across campus and get back to their rooms soaking wet.

I have a significant other that lives off campus, so if I want to hang out with him on the weekends, sometimes I go to his house. There are times where I don’t come back to campus until later in the evening. One time I came back and it was POURING out. I did not want to have to walk across campus and get back to my room soaking wet. I was tired and just wanted to go to sleep. If there are going to be as many people on campus as there are, I think there should be at least the same number of parking spots as rooms in the building. Martin Hall has 3 floors full of rooms yet the parking lot consists of maybe 35 spots, and that’s being generous.

Pace security vehicles and maintenance vehicles shouldn’t be allowed to park in residence parking spots. They should have specified parking for their vehicles. Even if it’s 2 in the morning, they should not be parking in residence parking spots. They are staff and should be parking in such a place specified. If maintenance is fixing something in a room, they should be able to park somewhere either in front of Martin or over near the Environmental center when doing work in Alumni.

This is purely an opinion. Some students do not care about the parking situation as they do not have cars on campus, but as for those of us who live in Alumni Hall and Martin Hall, parking can be a frustrating issue. I think there could be solutions to the problem. Some might be problematic and other might not, but I believe it is a conversation that should be had.​