Still Waiting for Spaces

Fifteen minutes pass as a person in a white Honda Civic circles the Jarvis parking lot looking for a parking spot. The Honda and other vehicles cruise the lot many times before they find a place to park.

This routine is not at all uncommon to students who drive to classes.

"I don't think there are enough parking spots on this campus for the number of students that have cars and need to park their cars," said Rena Malik, a sophomore health and human services major. "It's really frustrating to have to spend 15 minutes to an hour trying to find a spot when I have to get to class."

Among the biggest complaints from UB students are poor on-campus parking and difficulty in finding a spot without searching multiple lots.

"There is no parking problem. There is sufficient space on campus to park," said John Grela, director of Public Safety, jokingly before launching into descriptions of what officials have done and are still doing to ease the parking tribulations at UB.

In 2001 and 2002, UB hired Chance Management Advisors (CMA), a consulting group from Philadelphia, to survey both campuses and create solutions that would alleviate UB's parking woes. As a result, CMA gave UB officials over 90 suggestions that would help.

According to Grela, UB officials have completed 75 of the suggestions and the last 15 will be completed within a few years.

Grela said one of the suggestions given by the consultants was to build gated parking lots that would require a swipe for entry. But Grela and his staff decided that that suggestion was not reasonable for UB due to the weather in Buffalo and difficulty in removing snow.

Some students had their own suggestions.

"I don't think it could be too difficult to build a structure like two or three stories high, like a parking garage," said Manmeet Bedi, a senior anthropology major.

Grela said that parking garages have been recommended, but high costs have hindered any efforts to build them.

"Everyone thinks that is the best solution and we have asked a few companies to come and estimate the price for parking garages, but the estimates we were given were close to $12,000 per space area. These prices are astronomical," said Grela.

Maria Wallace, the assistant director of public safety, said the CMA suggested that the parking spaces available should be taken advantage of.

"There is an adequate amount of space but the problem is that it is not utilized," said Wallace. "We don't need to expand our parking. We need to use what we have. The Center for Tomorrow lot, the Alumni Lots are some examples of space that is not being used by people."

Wallace said that the only way to make use of these spaces is to promote the shuttle services that run on campus. She said shuttles are the best way for drivers to travel around campus without having to worry about moving their car and trying to find a spot.

"At the beginning of the fall semester, we handed out maps in the Student Union and promoted the Park and Ride options on campus," Wallace said. "We were trying to promote the option for drivers to park their cars in lots such as the Center for Tomorrow and take the shuttle to travel on campus."

But some students disagree with the solutions outlined by Wallace, saying that those suggested are inconvenient.

"That is such a hassle because the shuttles go all over campus before they get to where you need to go and that just wastes a lot of time," said Subanthini Fernando, a sophomore psychology major, who commutes to campus.

Some other suggestions that CMA gave were to improve the bus system on campus and advertise more so students will leave their car at the dorms.

"I think that the expectation of people is that they want to drive and they expect to find a spot that is close," Wallace said. "As a result, we want to promote the Park and Ride option as much as possible because that would help us make use of the parking lots that we currently have instead of expanding more."

While students continue to complain and the Park and Ride system continues to go unutilized by most, officials said the parking situation at UB is on its way to a resolution.

"We've tried to follow many of the recommendations that were given to us and as time passes, we are trying our best to alleviate the parking situation on campus," said Grela.