Unfortunately for the faculty and students of Augustana, the parking on campus is less than sufficient and changes need to be made.

One major issue with parking is that there simply are not enough spots. Depending on which dorm people live in, they should have a parking spot near their respective residential building. In order to park there, these students have purchased a parking pass.

However, the parking lot was so overfilled in Westerlin residence hall’s parking lot that some Westerlin residents had to get parking passes for the Erickson parking lot.

Obviously this is problematic because the Erickson lot is not even big enough for the students and residents who live in Erickson, which leads to Erickson residents parking in TLA spots.

Additionally, there is another lot for parking near the soccer field. Residents of Erickson are expected to park there and walk down the street to get to their dorm, just like the Seminary residents are expected to park in the parking lot across a busy street and walk to their dorm. Both of these situations are impractical and not ideal for student safety.

Not only is the parking on campus an issue because students do not have enough room to park, but it is also an issue because the parking lots are rarely shoveled and salted properly.

During these past few months cars have been stuck in ice and snow on the streets and in the parking lots because there’s just no plowing or shoveling being done at all.

Last year, I personally helped six different people push their cars out of snow because they were stuck in the unshoveled parking lots. Not only should parking lots be expanded, but they should be kept up with so that we get our money’s worth.

Sophomore Savanna Watson has been ticketed before for parking in other lots when there wasn’t enough space in the lot she had a pass for. People should not be getting ticketed for parking in other areas just because there’s not enough room in their designated parking lot.

Additionally, the parking lots on campus are full of potholes. This is evident in literally every single parking lot on campus except the Westerlin parking lot.

Since incoming freshmen get tours there, the school has managed to fix the Westerlin potholes.

There’s one specific pothole that is enormous in the Erickson parking lot that can cause problems for a multitude of cars already on this campus. According to a Your Mechanic  article, hitting a pothole can cause damage to the tires, wheels, suspension, exhaust, and body.

How bad does it need to get for Augustana to be able to fix this problem? When is Augustana going to realize that students are paying a lot of money to go here so they deserve to drive in the parking lot without possibly damaging their car from a pothole?

Either these problems need to be addressed and fixed, or the school needs to start charging a lot less for parking passes.

Everyone pays the same amount for these passes, however, not everyone is getting their money’s worth.

Expand the lots, shovel and plow, fix the potholes. Make it happen, Augustana.

 
Cartoon by Annie Wheeler/Observer Staff