Since June, students have been bombarded with new parking regulations, making parking on or around campus nearly impossible — especially if they plan on leaving their car for more than two hours.
On Thursday, the shock set in as girls returned to their sorority houses to find that the parking spots surrounding Burleson Park had been painted white with “2 hour” written across the curb and signs stating that these rules are in effect Monday through Friday from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
“The UP police did not even take into consideration our livelihood,” Kayla Klingseisen, a member of Pi Beta Phi, said. “They simply ambushed us with ‘2 hour parking’ now.”
According to city spokesman Steve Mace, the city was responding to years of complaints that there weren’t enough public parking spots surrounding the park.
The girls living in the Pi Beta Phi and Tri Delt houses are most inconvenienced by these new regulations.
“Parking outside of Tri Delt was already bad before they put the two hour parking in,” Alex Carr said.
Though there is a big parking lot on University Boulevard across from the Tri Delt and Kappa Alpha Theta house, parking spaces fill up quickly. There are also a handful of spots outside of the other sorority houses on Daniel Avenue, but students face the same issues on that street too.
“The problem with those lots is that anyone with a resident sticker can park in them,” Carr said.
Mace said that the university is starting construction within the next two weeks to expand the parking lot on University Boulevard.
“There will be an additional 54 spots in the university surface lot, south of Burleson Park, that will be available for students during the spring semester,” Mace said. “The university is fully supported of getting students, faculty and administration parking on