I circle the front parking lot three times before moving to the back lot. I now have seven minutes to find a spot and make it to class on time. As I scour each row of student parking, I continue to come up empty. The seven minutes has turned into three, and every student parking spot is already occupied. Finally, I find a spot in the park, but it’s too late. As I am hurrying to the building, the bell rings.
Many of my fellow classmates have encountered this very problem, as well. The parking situation has left us with two options: park in the park and walk the rest of the way to the building or park in a staff spot and risk being ticketed and fined by the school.
A lot fewer students would be faced with this dilemma if less parking permits had been sold. Despite there being 265 student parking spots, 330 permits were sold. Even after taking into consideration the students who SSL at other schools, attend CTC, have open campus and go to internships or work study, was it really necessary for the school to sell 65 more parking permits than there are parking spots?
I paid $20 to have permission to park in the school parking lot with the exclusion of staff and visitor spots, yet I arrive and the only spots left are those for staff and visitors.
Recently, administration decided to change 10 staff parking spots into student spots, which certainly helped but far from fixed the problem.
The lack of parking has many student drivers annoyed, but seniors are particularly frustrated about having to compete for a parking space. The 11th-graders, and especially the 10th-graders, should either park in the park or not drive to school at all.
The freshman, sophomore and junior classes will each have their time for claiming seniority, but they need to wait their turn, just as the current senior class did and the ones who came before us.
