Q & A: Information offered on new campus parking system

Q
& A: Information offered on new campus parking system
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Under severe
pressures created by long being an attractive island of
virtually free parking — free, that is, for everyone
except its own faculty, staff and students — in a sea
of high-priced parking facilities, Rice University will
introduce a new parking system this fall. Some final details
are still in flux, but the general plan is outlined below.

A key point
is that more than 1,800 free visitor parking spaces will
remain in two locations near Rice Stadium. Visitor parking
in four paid lots will be relatively inexpensive (75 cents
to $1.50 per hour), and many colleges and university offices
will be able to validate parking for invited guests.

The changes
are designed to better serve the university’s academic
programs by moving toward a parking program in which:

• Drivers,
eventually over a period of years, assume the true cost
of parking. Currently, more than $800,000 a year in educational
funds subsidizes parking.
• Better allocation shortens faculty and staff waiting
lists for spaces closer to their workplaces.
• Visitor parking is made less confusing by consolidating
it in six more easily found locations — more than 1,800
free spaces in two lots served by frequent shuttle buses
and four paid lots near major visitor destinations.
The changes, recommended by a faculty-staff-student committee
after a thorough study and expert internal and external
review, were driven by:
• Academic principles: Parking should be self-supporting,
not subsidized by educational funds.
• Area scarcity: While visitor parking at Rice has
been free, parking at adjacent, high-volume locations, such
as the Texas Medical Center, is very expensive. Thus, the
university has increasingly found itself providing free
parking to individuals whose destination is not even the
campus.
• Equity: Currently, Rice faculty, staff and students
pay to park; nearly 1 million visitors each year do not.

• Supply and demand: As with any valuable good that
is underpriced, demand for parking has outstripped supply.
In addition to cost factors, Rice teaching, research and
community outreach have welcomed large numbers of people
to campus. To meet alumni, student and faculty interest
in preserving precious green space, new buildings intentionally
have been built on surface parking lots, and an expensive
underground garage was built.

All this has
led Rice to a plan seeking optimum use of existing space,
placing garage parking below buildings or above existing
surface lots.

Some details
still are being refined. However, a series of questions
and answers may help explain things as they now stand.

Q: Who was
involved in the changes?
A: A thorough internal parking study was supplemented by
the work of outside parking consultants Kimley-Horn, university
professional staff and the university Standing Committee
on Parking. The committee’s resulting recommendations
were presented in approximately 33 meetings (representing
51 departments, schools, organizations and small groups)
of faculty, staff, students and alumni. These discussions
led to modification of several of the original recommendations.
The parking committee presented its recommendations to Rice
President Malcolm Gillis, who, upon advice of many he consulted,
further modified the plan.

Q: What are
the changes?
A: In short, visitor parking will be consolidated in six
well-defined lots — two providing free parking and
four charging 75 cents to $1.50 per hour. Many Rice offices
will have the option of providing validation to invited
guests. The larger faculty/staff lots east of Alice Pratt
Brown Hall will be gated. Rice faculty, staff and students
who pay for parking will have access to their lot through
“proximity cards,” which one waves in front of
a reader; visitors will gain access to lots and pay with
credit cards. In the Central Campus Garage (constructed
beneath the new Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Management
building), visitors may pay with cash, credit card or a
validation received from their hosts.

Q: Will there
be any free parking left on campus?
A: Yes; 1,575 spaces on the west side of Rice Stadium and
nearly 300 spaces behind the Rice University Police Department
(near Entrance 8 off University Boulevard) will be available.
Rice shuttle bus service will operate with greater frequency
and extended hours to these lots as demand warrants. The
number and location of free parking spaces will be evaluated
in one year.

Q: Will there
be free parking available for such events as homecoming
and commencement?
A: Yes. For such university-wide events, free parking will
be provided.

Q: What about
invited guests?
A: Many Rice offices will be able to provide validation
cards allowing invited guests to park in visitor lots free
of charge. Information on the validation program will be
issued when the details are worked out. In addition, special
arrangements will be made for such people rendering service
as community associates of the colleges and unpaid adjunct
faculty (keep reading for more information).

Q: What will
visitors pay for parking?
A: Hourly rates will be 75 cents for the visitor lot west
of the Shepherd School of Music. Three visitor lots closer
to the heart of campus will be $1.50 per hour. These lots
will be the lot immediately south of Founder’s Court
and near Entrance 2, the North Lot between Entrances 13
and 14 and the underground Central Campus Garage across
the street from the Ley Student Center.

Q: How will
visitors pay?
A: The Central Campus Garage will have a ticket-issuing
device at the entrance. Before getting in their cars to
depart, visitors will insert tickets into one of five Pay-On-Foot
(P-O-F) machines near the elevators on both floors and pay
with coins, currency, credit cards or validations. The machine
then issues an exiting ticket, which will be good for the
several minutes it takes visitors to locate their automobile
and drive to the exit lane of the garage. Inserting the
exiting ticket into a machine there opens the gate. A garage
attendant will be close by to assist the visitor if necessary.

At three surface
lots, visitors will insert a credit or check card (the machines
will not accept debit cards) to open the gate to enter the
lot. Upon leaving, they will again insert the same credit
or check card. A computer will calculate the time and automatically
charge the card. Each card transaction will take approximately
two seconds. All the new gates will have an assistance intercom
button to contact the parking office staff.

Q: What about
parking for athletic events?
A: Additional free parking will be provided for Rice athletic
events. And, of course, Rice paid-parking permits will be
honored as usual.

Q: What about
college associates?
A: Community associates of the residential colleges will
be given proximity cards that will work much like those
of students: allowing access to student lots at all times
and, on evenings and weekends, to most of the gated faculty
and staff lots, including the North, Abercrombie and Allen
Center lots. After 10 p.m., associates may use the Cohen
House lot.

Q: Will visitors
still be welcome?
A: Absolutely. Indeed, the university expects the rise in
the number of visitors — currently, nearly 1 million
per year — to continue. Remember that more than 1,800
spaces remain free of charge. As for the other spaces, Rice
alumni and visitors should understand that no parking is
ever free; someone is paying for paving, painting, signs,
patrols and repairs. The university believes that its alumni
and visitors support the university enough to accept 75
cents to $1.50 per hour as a small price to pay to preserve
limited funds for educational purposes. Paid visitor parking
has been the practice at almost all other universities and
particularly at other urban educational, cultural, medical
and recreational venues.

Q: How will
this affect faculty and staff?
A: The more efficient allocation of space is expected to
shorten waiting lists for parking near each individual’s
workplace. Fees for parking will rise — to $45 to $400
per year from the current range of $31 to $229— with
an eye on the goal of making parking self-supporting over
several years.

In addition
to a decal affixed to the car, faculty and staff purchasing
parking privileges will be given a proximity card, which
they will wave in front of a reader at the entrance to their
lot to gain entrance. On nights and weekends, faculty and
staff will be able to park in any faculty/staff surface
lot, so attending events should be as easy as it is today.
Emeritus faculty will continue to receive free parking (in
the form of a proximity card good in any faculty/staff lot)
as a retirement gift from the president.

Adjunct faculty,
who are teaching at Rice’s invitation and are unpaid,
will continue to be provided with free parking. They will
use a proximity card good for free parking for the semester
they are teaching.

Q: How will
this affect Rice students?
A: Students, too, will retain past parking privileges. As
with faculty and staff, fees will go up for next year —
e.g., rising to $8 from $0 at the low end and to $150 from
$94 at the high end. As with faculty, staff and visitor
rates, student rates will increase over time as the university
works toward making parking self-supporting.

In the evenings,
the computerized system will give students access to most
of the spaces in gated faculty and staff lots. After 5:30
p.m. these include the North, Abercrombie and Allen Center
lots. After 10 p.m., students may use the Cohen House lot.
As in the past, students will have access to most of the
spaces in these same lots on weekends. They will need to
use their proximity cards to enter.

During this
fall’s semester, the road from Entrance 3 to College
Way will be extended and accessible after the campus gates
are closed at midnight. This will improve students’
late-night direct access from College Way to the Allen Center
and south colleges lots. Students will not have to drive
around the Cohen House and, in fact, will have access to
that part of the lot after 10 p.m.

During the day,
bollards will limit access to the lane in front of Lovett
College and the area between the Allen Center lot entrances
to bicycles, emergency vehicles and specific service vehicles.
This will help reduce non-Rice drivers’ cutting across
campus. When the bollards are down, this lane will be a
two-way road; thus, the university will not be able to allow
15-minute business stops (with flashers). Some unloading
accommodations may be possible for move-in and move-out
days.

Q: When will
gates be installed?
A: For close-in lots, gates are scheduled to be in place
by Sept. 1. The stadium lots should be gated by Jan. 1,
2003. Not all lots will be gated: For reasons that include
access for deliveries and difficulty in placing gates, many
small lots and college lots will continue to be enforced
by parking patrols and tickets.

There will be
a few new rules regarding lot entry and damage to gates.
These will include rather stiff penalties for “pass-back”
violations (letting unauthorized people into a lot with
one’s proximity card) or damage to entry/exit gates
and equipment, including loss of parking privileges on campus
and, in some cases, towing.

Q: Will gating
cause traffic to back up onto perimeter streets or block
campus roadways?
A: No, streets and campus roadways will not be affected.
All gates will be at the entrance to individual lots, not
at campus entrances or on campus roadways. And because lots
will have multiple entrances and the mechanisms are fast,
backups at lot entrances are expected to be minimal. The
main change will be that drivers will not be able to cut
across many parking lots because of gates.

Q: Will this
affect neighboring communities?
A: University leaders do not believe there will be noticeable
impact. The price increases for faculty, staff and student
parking are moderate, the price of paid visitor lots is
low, and Rice will continue to provide more than 1,800 free
parking spaces served by shuttles. So, there will be little
reason for Rice-bound drivers to park on neighboring streets.
Rice and the University Place Association also cooperated
in helping pass a city ordinance last year providing for
resident-only decal parking. There also may be small benefits.
Visitors should wander less because of improved signage
directing them to the right entrances and consolidated visitor
lots. New paper and online maps are being developed to help
guide invited guests to these entrances and lots. After
a brief period of adjustment, it will be easier for everyone
whose destination is Rice to find parking.

Q: Will this
be an easy transition?
A: It is hoped so, but no matter how expert the parking
plan, there are no plans known of that worked perfectly
on the first try. Experience will indicate what physical,
procedural and policy adjustments will be necessary. The
university is determined to do what it takes to get it right.

While change
is never easy for anyone, through thorough planning, better
signage and people stationed on-site to help in the early
days, the university hopes to make this as smooth a transition
as possible.

Once the adjustments
— in parking and by all of those who use it —
are completed, the goals of convenient, rational, self-supporting
parking at Rice can be reached.