Brainstorming parking

I can barely go about a day on campus without struggling to find a parking spot myself or hearing about a classmate struggling to find a spot for himself.

Most of us complain about parking and for good reason. It is very hard to find a parking spot on campus, especially if you want a parking spot anywhere near where you want to go.

Even though there is so much complaining going on, I hear very few ideas about how to actually fix the situation. Furthermore, nobody seems to like the ideas put forth by the university, and many complain that the university’s proposed lots are too far away from students’ final destinations.

To solve this parking problem, I propose making the roads around campus into one-way streets. This would include the stretch of Luther Drive from the traffic circle by Trojan Dining Hall to the traffic circle by the golf course and then back to Sartain Hall, as well as the stretch of University Avenue from Sartain Hall to the Trojan Dining Hall.

Making these roadways one way would eliminate the need for one of the lanes on that circle. The other lane could then be used for parking. This system would both provide many more parking spaces and create a safety feature for pedestrians.

If my idea were implemented, the extra lane, where it’s wide enough, would be made into slanted parking spots like those between Pace Hall and the baseball field. Where the lane is not wide enough, it would be made into parallel parking spots like those by the lake on McKinley Drive.

Compared to the university’s plans of building lots around the outskirts of campus, this idea would be much less expensive and provide parking where it is needed. No new asphalt would be necessary. All that would be needed to complete this project would be paint to mark the new parking spots and signs to mark the one-way streets. In addition, this plan would provide parking much closer to where students and faculty need to go as opposed to parking on the outskirts of campus.

This would also encourage drivers to find alternate routes rather than driving straight through campus just to get to the other side, reducing traffic flow.

This lessened traffic through campus would also serve as a safety feature. Less cars would drive through campus and those that did would move much slower, making the campus safer for pedestrians.

This new system may not solve the parking problem forever, but I believe it would be a largely effective and fiscally responsible improvement to our current parking system.