It’s no secret that UH parking is a hassle, but with over 1,000 spots unavailable since crews broke ground in lot 15D for the new parking garage, students are being forced to extensively plan their routine just to find somewhere to park.
Work on the corner of Holman and Cullen near Robertson Stadium will construct a new parking garage that will provide 2,300 spots to students and visitors to alleviate the parking headache. In the meantime, students’ best bet is to wake up early and hit the road.
“Fridays are easy for me because I guess people don’t really have too many classes then, but the rest of the week, it takes 45 minutes to an hour just looking for a spot,” said biology freshman May Maung. “I try to be here two hours ahead just in case because I don’t like to be late or rushed, and I feel like if I don’t leave the house early enough, I’m definitely going to be late because I was looking for parking.”
Since the first day of the semester, UHDPS has had traffic control out in parking lots like 16B on the corner of Cullen and Elgin to ease some of the morning congestion as students make their way to campus.
“It’s OK that they’re there for when it gets crowded, but they’re not really telling people when the lot is full,” said media production student Lorely DeLeon. “I notice that sometimes after 9 a.m., they put orange cones (at the entrance) to let you know it’s full, but sometimes they don’t, and I have to drive around wasting gas looking for a spot when there’s none.”
UHDPS provides students with an interactive parking availability map and a Twitter feed to notify commuters when certain lots are filled to capacity.
“I used to use the app they have, and that really helped,” said kinesiology sophomore Mark Tiu. “Now I don’t have a way to see it, but I think it would be good if they had some kind of texting service because not everyone has a smartphone.”
According to UH Traffic’s Twitter feed, most lots are filled to capacity by 10 a.m., sometimes earlier. When this happens, students can either wait around or go to the Energy Research Park lot at 5000 Gulf Freeway. The shuttle, which drops students off at the University Center, is available between 7 a.m. and 7 p.m.
“I think the easiest thing is just to leave early to find parking,” said Tiu. “Even if I’m here too early, I can still go to the library and study for a while before my first class starts.”
That's alright! Very small price to pay for the progress being done to the campus. Unbelievable exciting time to be a Cougar. That goes for academics, campus improvements and athletics.
They could build a very tall parking structure and solve the parking woes. But that's not what they're doing, is it?
Additional parking is irrelevant if they keep admitting more and more students every year.