Parking Wars

Parking Wars

Lack of Parking Spaces on Campus Causes Uproar between

Students and Campus Safety

            Many are familiar with the hit A&E show “Parking Wars,” where independent towing companies in big cities like New York face off against illegal parkers. In the show, fugitive parkers go to extremes to keep their cars from being towed and plead their cases to the imperturbable Judge Caprio. Well, Avila students may not have quite reached these extremes yet, but there has undoubtedly been an increase of frustration when it comes to parking on campus this semester.    

According to the Campus Safety department, in the parking lots surrounding campus there are 250 designated spaces for residents, 40 for employees, and 25 for disabled or handicapped. The remaining 500 undesignated spaces are open for commuters, visitors, and future Avila students. There are approximately 1800 students currently enrolled, this number excludes employees and visitors, and only a total of 815 parking spaces. With these numbers, parking at Avila is like a never ending game of musical chairs, someone is always left without a place to park.

“We are working on designating a number of parking spaces for resident students equal to the number of parking permits issued by the Campus Safety office and ask that resident students park only in resident parking spaces as instructed,” said Chris Roberts, manager of Campus Safety.

For those students residing in Carondelet, the best parking is in front of the third floor of Avila Hall or the drive to the north down the hill. Students in Ridgway are asked to park in the lot between Ridgway and Thompson. Next to Carondelet there will be spaces for commuter students and employees, although the majority of that parking is in the large lot north of Blasco and the lots along the west half of campus.

In the past few years, many commuters found a resolution to the lack of spaces by parking along Oak Street hill behind Dallavis Center. This proved to be a solution up until the city of Kansas began ticketing those cars with no prior warning to tell students it was a no-parking zone. Now, there are clear no-parking signs along the Oak Street hill to deter students from congesting the street. Commuters are now asked to park along the residential streets surrounding campus when no spaces are available in the Blasco lot.

“Avila also is fortunate in this large metro area to have three sides of campus surrounded by peaceful residential streets. It’s no different than parking in any residential or business area, such as the Country Club Plaza or downtown Kansas City. People need to use due diligence and care anytime they park on a public street,” said Roberts.

For being less than half way through the semester, the mere number of parking violations is proof that there is a problem. Many of the violations were due to students simply not having a parking permit at all. The majority of the others were for cars parked in places that were not parking spaces. Failure to park inside the spaces causes obstruction of traffic and can prevent the entrance of emergency vehicles.

“By everybody having a parking permit in a similar location, this aids Campus Safety’s ability to identify vehicles quickly and be able to quickly spot vehicles of strangers or visitors. This allows Campus Safety to be more vigilant in detecting possible security concerns,” said Roberts.

Students, faculty, and staff are asked to aide Campus Safety in maintaining Avila’s reputation as a safe place to be. Everyone is encouraged to do their part by following the parking policy which allows smooth traffic flow on and around campus. For Avila’s full parking policy, refer to the student handbook at www.avila.edu.