The completion of the Residential Commons created one looming question in students’ minds: where are these 1,200 additional residents going to park?
The university’s solution was the construction of the Mustang Parking Center. The resident-only parking structure opened along with the five new residence halls in August.
“It will help accommodate parking for most of the new residents who now live on campus rather than commute to campus,” said Director of ID Card Services Mark Rhodes and Associate Vice President for Campus Services Julie Wiksten.
The Mustang Parking Center is unique in that it is the only resident-only parking garage on campus. It has space for 800 vehicles.
In addition to the Mustang Parking Center, students may park in the Airline, Binkely, Meadows, Moody and Daniel Parking Centers.
SMU also expanded the commuter lot to hold an additional 240 vehicles.
However, many students are concerned that these additions will not ease the troubles with parking on campus.
“I’m glad they added parking, but they need to add more convenient parking locations,” senior Rebecca Keay said. “There aren’t enough spots for people going to class and going to the gym.”
With the abundance of ongoing construction on campus, the increase in convenience of parking will not occur soon.
“There will be approximately 80 fewer resident parking spaces in the South Quad lot due to construction of the pedestrian mall and there will be no parking around Peyton Parkway during demolition of the old Memorial Health Center and construction of the new Dr. Bob Smith Memorial Health Center,” Rhodes said.
According to Rhodes, faculty spots will also be misplaced for about 30 days during the construction of the new Harold Simmons building and Ford Research Center. During this time, employees will park in the expanded commuter lot along University Boulevard and Airline Road.
Parking along sorority row will also decrease with the construction of the Delta Gamma house.
Students have their own ideas on how to solve the continuing problems with parking on campus.
“In the parking garages there is way too much staff parking,” junior Becca Zivin said. “They need to look at the ratio of staff to students and figure out what’s appropriate.”
“Maybe people could try parking on the boulevard,” Keay said.
Rhodes and Wiksten believe public transportation could be a solution.
“We encourage the use of alternative transportation by providing students with annual DART transit passes for a one-time charge of only $5,” Rhodes said. “We also operate the 768 SMU Express and 743 Museum Express shuttles.”
Changes to the two routes effective Monday decreased service time from Mockingbird Station to Bishop Boulevard from 20 minutes to 10 minutes.
Have any questions about parking? Visit the Parking and ID Card Services office at the Expressway Tower or email [email protected].
