Parking Decal Registration Offered Online

Parking Decal Registration Offered Online

RICE NEWS
April 22, 1999

For the first time, Rice faculty, staff and students can register vehicles
online to obtain parking decals.

A Web page is being developed for Rice employees and students who registered
vehicles during the past year. It will be available through the Rice University
Police Department (RUPD) home page: http://rupd.rice.edu/. Returning faculty,
staff and students will be able to handle their parking registration over the
Web once the pages are constructed. The parking decals will be mailed by campus
mail after the new traffic and parking regulations are printed.

First-time registration must be done with a signed form, but that too can be
downloaded from the RUPD Web page. It should be filled out and sent with payment
(or election of payroll deduction) by campus mail to the Parking Office–MS
551.

Also offered for the first time this year is the option of paying for parking
for faculty and staff in pretax dollars. Federal law has changed since the last
registration period, and faculty and staff who pay through payroll deduction
may choose to have their parking fees paid in pretax dollars. This can be a
savings of 15 percent or more depending on the tax bracket of the individual.
If interested, check the pretax election when registering online.

Each year the Parking Committee reviews the cost of operating the shuttle service
and recommends parking fees to cover those costs. For the next fiscal year,
parking fees will increase $5 a year for the front of campus lot ("M"
lot decal)–to $200 from $195 per year, or $16.67 per month. Fees for other
faculty/staff close-in lots increase $7–to $105 from $98, or $8.75 per month.
Stadium lot parking (and shuttle fees, if you are a student) increase $6.50
to $17 per year, or $1.42 per month.

Parking fees for the 1999-2000 school year are: Cohen House/Lovett Hall/Allen
Center lots ("M" decal), $200 annually, $16.67 monthly; other close-in
faculty/staff lots, $105 annually, $8.75 monthly; close-in college lots, $88
annually, $7.33 monthly; and stadium faculty/staff, $17 annually, $1.42 monthly.
Students who have the close-in college decals pay the shuttle fee of $17 and
the close-in fee of $88, totaling $105.

This summer two close-in lots (faculty/staff lot "H" and college
lot "R") will become the construction site for South College. The
impact of this construction will be that 100 lot "H" cars and 150
lot "R" cars must be moved to other lots, with the stadium lot absorbing
the most. Because this will increase stadium parking and riders of the shuttle
buses, an additional bus and driver will be added this fall. In the summer of
2000, the Jones College parking lot "B" and perhaps portions of Abercrombie
lot "C" will be lost to a construction site for Martel College. This
and other construction on campus over the coming three years will further increase
shuttle utilization. A second additional bus and driver may be needed for fiscal
year 2001 and beyond.

As a comparison, parking rates were checked in Houston. In downtown Houston,
parking rates now range from $135 to $185 per month ($1,620 to $2,220 per year).
At the Texas Medical Center (TMC), inside lots and garage rates are $86.60 per
month ($1,039 per year), and very remote parking outside the TMC is $43.30 per
month ($520 per year). University of Texas and Baylor medical schools have special
rates for their employees–$40 per month for garages ($480 per year) or $10
to $15 per month ($120 to $180 per year) for the very remote lots outside TMC.