United Students makes garage parking a priority
Parking on campus for students is troublesome enough; paying at night is unreasonable for the coalition
The coalition wants to have parking at the Kansas Unions’ parking garage to be free after 5 p.m. on weekdays.
By Brenna Hawley (Contact)
Wednesday, March 26th, 2008
Allowing free parking in the garage attached to the Kansas Union is United Students’ second platform.
The coalition wants to open the top level of the garage to free parking every weekday after 5 p.m. Students must pay to park at the garage all day and night during the week but it is free on weekends.
Students who have a valid parking pass can park in the garage during weekdays.
They also want to open the entire garage for free on basketball game days. If elected, United Students will propose this measure next fall with hopes to implement it by Spring 2009.
Michael Gillaspie, Ashland junior and United Students vice presidential candidate, said many groups held meetings in the Kansas Union after 5 p.m. but still had to pay for parking.
Photo by Mindy Ricketts
Student Senate coalition United Students wants to give students free parking in the Kansas Union parking garage. They propose to make parking in the top level of the garage free after 5 p.m. so students can go to night meetings and classes more easily. They also want to make the entire garage free on basketball game days because basketball fans take many other spots on campus.
He said the coalition was trying to make campus more accessible to off-campus students. The night campus express bus is free for students and departs from the Kansas Union to take students to locations around campus.
Adam McGonigle, Wichita sophomore and United Students presidential candidate, said the Kansas Union parking garage was one of the only places on campus that students still had to pay to park in at night.
“It takes so much time to drive all over campus looking for that one spot at night, and there is an entire garage that sits virtually empty,” McGonigle said.
McGonigle said that during basketball games, fans took most other spots on campus because they were closer to Allen Fieldhouse.
Gillaspie said other things happened on campus during basketball games, and free parking in the garage would give these people an easy place to park.
“During basketball games, students still have mid-terms,” Gillaspie said.
May Davis, transportation coordinator for the Parking Department and member of United Students, said any proposal from United Students had to go through the Parking Commission. Davis, Clay Center sophomore, said the commission was made up of students, faculty and staff and that it made all parking and transit decisions that are later implemented by the Parking Department. McGonigle said that he spoke with Davis before forming his platform, but that it wasn’t her idea.
Davis also said the new Sabatini Multicultural Resource Center next to the Kansas Union increased the number of people at the Kansas Union at night.
“The Kansas Union is such a hub of activity, and the fact that it’s not at the center of campus is a problem,” Davis said.
She said the campus night express bus helped with that, but it departed from the front of the Kansas Union, not from Mississippi Street where yellow parking lots were. She said free parking in the Kansas Union would help facilitate the increased traffic.
Danny Kaiser, assistant director of the Parking Department, said allowing free parking in the garage would affect the budget, but he didn’t know how much. He said the department had to do a study to see how much money it made from the parking garage to know how much it would be affected. He said the department did make money from the garage, where people have to pay to park at all times during weekdays.
Kaiser said the department took out a bond to pay for the parking garage in 1999. As of June 30, 2007, there was more than $5 million left to pay on the garage. It originally cost more than $11 million and is planned to be paid off by 2014.
McGonigle said that United Students realized the department had to pay off the garage, but also said the department was very cooperative in finding better parking for students.
Free parking in the Kansas Union parking garage was a platform for the KUnited coalition in Spring 2005. Davis said it probably didn’t pass then because the parking commission didn’t like the idea. She said the commission members changed each year, so proposals passed depending on the makeup of the commission.
Kaiser said that parking had never been free at the Kansas Union parking garage after 5 p.m. on weekdays but was free on weekends.
—Edited by Matt Hirschfeld
Discussion
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I really don't see what good opening up the union after 5:00 PM will do for students. I already park there after 5...
It is available to any valid ku permit after 5p. And if you change that, are you really helping off-campus students or non-KU? And from what I heard, it would only be the top level for free. Tell me how you police that. And then tell the schol hallers that are required to have permits there (and park there as substitute for a residential lot) why the top level is always full and they can't use it.
I think that when people say parking at KU sucks, they don't mean after 5 p.m.
What they generally mean is circiling around lot 90 at 10:00 a.m. (where a previous United Students plan removed 50 parking spots from student use). I applaud US for trying to fix the parking problem at KU, but just like their pool platform, this is a half-hearted, ineffective idea.
I think students need to know that student senate, the parking department, or anyone at the university can't truly "fix" the parking problem at KU. We go to school on a hill. As long as the majority of KU students drive to class, parking will always suck.
Parking after 5pm definitely isn't the only parking problem on campus... but it is one of them.
As long as they can get approval from whoever oversees this , it sounds like a good start.
Good point. To fix the parking problem, you have to start somewhere. Why not start by fixing one of the problems that has already been pinpointed? Maybe daytime parking would be the logical next step. Sounds to me like United Students gets kudos for addressing a problem and beginning to implement solutions. Ineffective? Doesn't sound like it to me.
True. Gotta start somewhere.
I just don't think voters appreciate deceptive names for facebook groups like:
"United Students = Better Parking"
I think that students see right through that crap.
sista08,
What are you giving United Students kudos for? Parking in the garage after 5pm? According to Parking, the Mississippi St. Garage is already open between 5:00pm and 7:00am every night to anyone with a valid KU Permit. I have parked there after 5:00pm almost every night for the past 3 years while I study/work/hangout at the Union. So really, this was implemented at least 3 years ago... United Students was created last year.
So to answer your question/statement "Ineffective?" I say yes. Parking after 5 is not a problem for students. Parking during basketball and football games is a problem for students. Parking before 5 is a problem. Lets pretend that the Union was 24hrs restriced: this is still an ineffective plan.
Last year, students complained about parking, they voted for United Students. This year, students lost parking and parking got worse. Why would you vote for United Students again?
I think the goal is that it opens the lot up to students who DON'T currently have a parking pass.
Tons of people don't have parking passes and currently can't use the lot - and my guess is that this is aimed at them.
Just a thought...
I think the moped initiative will do wonders to solve the parking problem, all times of day.
The Parking Department has proven numerous times to not do what is in the best interests of the students. They oversell parking passes and are obviously one of the greediest departments on this campus. We need to take the responsibility of this problem and at least make it better while we wait on the bureaucrats.
If more people at this university drove mopeds, they wouldn't take up parking spots.
How do we encourage this? Right now the Parking Department charges $25 for a parking pass on a moped. This doesn't make sense because they're not using parking spots.
Mopeds use very little gas (I buy $2/month in gas), do not need insurance, and are really convenient.
The best way to fix the parking problem is to find something better than a parking space: a bike rack right next to your class.
If you like this idea, check out Students of Liberty.
Eh, I'm unimpressed, but at least it's better than the pool that's already happening.
Yeah, it seems like everything that United Students comes from something that either someone else came up with, or is already happening.
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