Surviving early semester parking madness

Staff Writer

Many students at Hudson Valley experience daily frustrations when it comes to finding a parking spot. While the parking situation has calmed down quite a bit over the years, trying to find a place to park still generates no shortage of problems.

For students who don’t drive to campus, this problem might be unfamiliar. There are ten parking lots across campus available for students to use, and even if those fill up, there is additional space for students to park across the street behind the former Country Grove Restaurant.

Many students and faculty will tell you that if you want to get what passes for a decent parking spot, you need to get here early.

“I usually don’t have a problem getting a spot, but then again I get here at eight [in the morning], so the best advice I can give is get here as early as possible,” said Jack Gigandet, an electrical engineering major.

“I got a nice little dent under my passenger side taillight, and it’s not even two weeks into the semester,” said William Moore, a criminal justice major.

Dennis Kennedy, executive director of communications and marketing, says that any student who gets hit, or who sees someone getting hit, should report it to the Public Safety office in the Siek Campus Center.

“We’ve made a lot of progress with regard to the parking,” Kennedy said. Since 2009, many changes have been made to alleviate problems with parking on campus. Most of the parking lots have been reconfigured to make traffic flow more easily, and in 2010, a five-story parking lot was built.

In the past five years, Public Safety has increased its presence near the entrances to the campus. For the first few weeks of the semester, the college has increased the number of signs around the parking lots. “This is really to help new students find their way around and find a place to park,” Kennedy said.

The mad rush to leave campus can be another cause of problems for students. “Last Friday when I left here, it was really busy and there was four or five cars that crashed into each other,” said Sydney Curtis, an individual studies major.

“Have an exit strategy,” said Alex Brown, also in individual studies. “Park closest to the building that your last class is in and leave as soon as possible, beat the rush.”

The college has alleviated much of the stress associated with parking through its agreement with CTDA allowing current students to ride the bus for free.

“On average, 1500 students take the bus here each month, and that has certainly reduced the amount of cars on campus,” Dennis Kennedy said. “Students concerned about parking can always carpool or take the bus.”