By Emma Morgan, Chelsey Weber, Patrick Moloney, Arianna Jordan, Michael Bologna, and Aidan Powers
Parking isn’t something that most would be concerned about. However, as a college student at SUNY Cortland, this is a big concern.
Student Concerns
According to the SUNY Cortland website, there are a total of 19 staff lots. However, there are only three commuter lots, all of them being located on south campus. The problem is that education buildings are on north campus. Walking from the commuter lots to Van Hoesen takes about 15 minutes.
“Living off campus, parking is not bad at the houses and is quite easy,” said Kenny Wilson, a senior. “But when you want to drive to class, there is no parking. The absurd amount of parallel parking that goes all the way down Broadway is ridiculous. Not everybody has a small car to do that, so they resort to parking spots. Unfortunately, there are no parking spaces. It is hell to find any type of parking for class.”
Negative Impacts of the Parking Situation
The lack of parking is affecting students’ academics, causing them late or possibly making them miss class. This issue could be easily fixed and is extremely avoidable. If the faculty lots were open to students as well, I guarantee students would attend their classes more, as well as overall do better in their classes.
There are three commuter lots and four residential lots. Of these four residential lots one of them is closed whenever there is a home football game, leaving the residents with only three lots to choose from some days. According to some students, this makes it even more difficult to park with the constant changing of schedules.
All residential students can have their car on campus, which is a luxury if students have to run out to grab a few needed things, but also is said to be a hassle since there are four or only three parking lots available some days.
Words from Students
Two on-campus students, Logan Wendt and Stefan Swedlund, both own cars that they have on campus, and said the parking lots are too far.
“It takes me about 15 minutes to walk from my dorm to my car, and if I were to take the bus, I would have to switch buses to go to D lot,” said Swedlund. “The current parking situation is inconvenient.”
Swedlund said he is unhappy with the way parking penalties are issued. The close lots near the Student Life Center or Park Center are usually always full, which forces
students to park in D-lot to prevent getting a ticket parking anywhere else.
D-lot is at the very outskirts of campus and approximately 1.3 miles away from the location of most of the dorms. It is even further for the dorms located at the top of the hill by the library. This makes it difficult for students to quickly walk to and from their car.
“I hate how it’s set up,” said Wendt.
Wendt suggested the parking could be reorganized and made easier on the students so they don’t have to make that long walk to D-Lot just to be able to use the car they paid to have on campus.
The Bus System
One way the campus has tried to help this situation is with the bus system. Buses run regularly throughout the day, but stop early in the evening. Some students, like Aliana Amadiz, say they are frustrated when they have to walk late at night from parking lots, especially when there is no bus running.
“It can be annoying when you come back to campus late at night and there’s no parking besides the farthest parking lot away,” said Amadiz. “It can also be annoying when the bus stops running and you need to leave campus.”
Another student, Ryan Hobbes, agreed.
“I’m not a fan,” said Hobbes. “I think it’s unreasonable that a student might get back to the school at a late hour, and to find parking they must drive almost a mile away from their dorm, and have the 25-30 minute walk back in very cold temperatures or any type of weather because the busses aren’t running at these times.”
Student Experience
Looking at other college campuses, like Binghamton University, there are many parking spots right outside the dorm buildings. Kara Dumas, a sophomore physical education major who plays golf for the school, said she wishes Cortland could have the same.
“The parking here is bad because there aren’t enough parking lots that are within walking distance from the dorms,” said Dumas. “Either build more parking spots or make more parking spots 24/7.”
With no close options for parking close to the dorms, a lot of students try to park in the
lots next to the dorms that are labeled as not available.
“It could be a lot better if our school were not so quick to hand out tickets,” said Luke Gallo. “It genuinely makes no sense that a car that is parked next to a residential hall overnight gets handed a $25 ticket. Why hand out a $25 ticket to students who do not have the money to keep spending on tickets and do not want to do a 25-minute walk from D-LOT? It is just an excuse to grab more money from students, and we need change.”
Every time a student receives a ticket for parking in the wrong spot, they are given a $25 ticket, and sometimes their car is towed. Molly Miller, a student athlete at Cortland, said she was once woken at 3:00 AM by a call from UPD saying her car would be towed if she didn’t move it.
“I then had to get up and move my car to D-Lot and walk back 25 minutes alone at 3am to my dorm,” said Miller. “I felt very unsafe walking back the whole time since it was pitch black and no one was there to escort me.”
Faculty Opinion
Faculty like economics professor Caitlin McKillop say they are sympathetic.
“The faculty lots are not horrendous,” said McKillop. “They could have more spots and there could be more room, but it isn’t as bad as the student parking I’ve seen.”
Students’ Hope for Better Parking
Clearly, parking at Cortland is a hassle, but there is hope that with the new construction being done in front of the Smith and Casey Towers, more parking opportunities for easier car access will open up. There is no information about this construction available online yet, but the word around campus is that this lot will be open to faculty and staff members. Perhaps in turn one of the faculty parking lots will be given to the students giving some relief with this issue.