Student’s angrily circling parking lots the first week of classes might find a little relief in an underutilized service the school provides.
Overcrowded parking lots the early in the semester are nothing new, but this year the school has an agreement with the Assumption of Blessed Virgin Greek Orthodox Church to allow students to park. The school is also providing shuttles that run from the off site lot to campus.
When the general parking lots begin to fill up, university police officers disperse into the lots to inform drivers of the overflow lot.
“Someone handed me a slip [with the address] in the parking lot,” senior film major William Jaskold said. “I was driving around for half a CD, so probably at least 30 minutes.”
Promotion of the extra parking has been kept fairly quiet, according to Brigitte Driller, CSULB’s Sustainable Transportation Coordinator. Other than the slips of paper handed out at times of peak overcapacity, the only other promotion is a paragraph on the university’s Parking and Transportation Services homepage.
“I’ve been driving [to school] for the past three years and my brother is an incoming freshman and I’ve told him that parking on Monday and this whole week is going to be crazy,” said Adam Ramos, a junior majoring in healthcare administration. “So he left [home] two hours early just to get parking. If you get here at 7:30 you’ll find parking but if you get here at 11, you won’t. It’s impossible.”
Through Thursday, campus police officers will walk around full parking lots and parking structures on campus to reccommend students trying to find parking use the overflow lot at the Greek Orthodox Church on E. Colorado Street.
Motorists parking the lot have to be out once the last shuttle drops them off, according to Driller. The lot is only available for overflow parking between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m. with free shuttles to campus roughly every 10 minutes. And the parking lot is only being made available until Thursday of this week.
“It’s been working out well so far this year,” Driller said. “I’m sill worried that someone’s car is going to get trapped when they close the gates.”
The school has roughly 13,000 parking spaces for a campus with about 37,500 students, plus faculty and staff. Despite this, there were very few students parked in the overflow lot, with only one or two getting off the shuttle by the afternoon.
“The lot was busiest earlier in the day,” said Ralph Caldin, the shuttle driver for the overflow lot. “It was not full at any point today.”
The use of overflow parking is not new, last year the school used a lot near the marina for students, Driller said. But the use of the lot at the Greek Orthodox Church was established as part of a trade, Driller said. The school traditionally lets the Greek Orthodox Church use its lots for overflow parking during the Greek Festival held during Labor Day Weekend.
The Assumption of Blessed Virgin Greek Orthodox Church is located at 5761 E. Colorado St. and any driver parking there will need a valid CSULB parking permit.