Parking lots overcrowded at Wesley

Overcrowded parking lots and misused handicap parking spaces have created troubles for Wesley students.The amount of parking passes issued to students exceeds the amount of parking spaces available to students.

Faded handicap parking spot outside of Roe Hall

“There are 483 parking spots on campus, spaces along the road are also available and permits are not required,” said Walter Beaupre, head of security. “Four hundred seventy-five parking passes have been admitted to students, and 105 spaces are for faculty/administration.”

Walter Beaupre, head of security

That means 378 parking spaces are available to students. If all the students who had parking permits park on any given day, 97 would not have a space. Commuters are also required to have parking passes and to park in in the spaces provided by Wesley.
Bookhammer (next to Bennett Chapel) and Wilkins (next to Longwood Hall) lots both open up to students after 5 p.m., but are reserved for faculty from 6 a.m. – 5 p.m. Beaupre said there are 10 handicap parking spots on campus.

Dominic McnAulty, a junior at Wesley who lives in Roe Hall, said some people abuse the handicap spaces.
I see students park in the faded handicap space in front of Roe with no penalty all of the time,” he said “I don’t think it is a valid space anymore.”

Anyone who parks in handicap space without a pass may be fined between $250-$1,000. According to U.S News Report, 60 percent of Wesley students have a car. Students are required to park outside of the buildings they live in.
There are parking garages for Malmberg and Zimmerman halls.

Junior Patrick Schlosser commutes to Wesley every day for classes. He said parking can be inconvenient at times.
“The parking here is more convenient for on campus students, which is fine, but commuters need better options especially during the day,” he said “Wesley needs better ways to inform commuters about parking.”

Wesley College doesn’t have a policy against freshmen having cars on campus. This could be a cause of overcrowded parking. Students believe there should be some expansion as far as parking goes.

Junior Alec Laise, also a commuter, said the school should expand parking.
“I hear people complain about it all of the time,” he said. “Most people complain about how freshman take up a majority of the spots.”

Over crowded parking lot at Wesley college

Texas A&M University has a similar problem. It has given out 36,105 parking passes with 31,313 spaces on campus. According to Brooke West, Journalist at Texas A&M, Texas A&M has a method to where they will over sell parking lots designated to commuters

“if a commuter lot had 1,000 spaces, transportation services would oversell the lot by 800 to 850 spaces,” she said.

If parking lots are designated to on-campus students then those parking lots aren’t over sold.

“If the lot is primarily residence hall students, we can’t oversell there. If it’s a commuter lot, there’s constant turnover so you’ll have much higher oversell,” she said.

Wesley may have the opportunity to expand on the parking spaces in the near future. The main problem has been finding land.
“Hopefully with the emergence of president Clark, enough money will be generated to make moves like this possible,” said Laise “ Its something current and future students can benefit from, especially if the retention rate increases.”