Issues with Having a Car on Campus
This article was submitted by Brittney Dellaquila.
Bloomsburg-Cars are adorned with the required colors of either blue, black, purple, and green.
Bloomsburg University allows freshman to bring their cars to campus and park in what is known as the Blue Lot. The parking lot is located on upper campus past the JKA apartment buildings. The cars are parked on unpaved, pot-holed, and on rainy days a mud pit.
Students have had fears of “walking to get to my car and having mud and rain water thrown up on me when other students drive their cars past me” spoke out Alyssa Barilla, a current undergrad here at Bloom.
Freshmen along with many other students find themselves fighting against the Bloomsburg University Police Department. These fights include parking in areas they are not supposed to, along with getting parking tickets, and occasionally bright orange boots on their cars; “it’s like they know my car and go after it “said Maddie Abrams, a current BU undergrad. Director of Police, Tom Phillips explained that his police staff do not have a designated ticketing route, they have people ranging from walking to driving to make sure the parking on campus is taken care of.
Most of the time the students only know of the lot that they have been assigned with the occasional stops at the parking meters. Tom Phillips metioned “ we have over flow parking in orange lot and the stadium lot” students can park there, and it is even close to the bus stops.
There are in total 40 parking lots on campus, most are specifically for staff and commuters. A popular complaint on campus is there is no place for guest parking. The University offers free parking passes from the University Police station, visitors must abide by the same rules as residents, and they can only park in the lot behind the library. A downfall to these regulations is that there is no overnight parking for guest and visitors unless it is the weekend.
Students have proposed that the University should invest in a parking deck that is just for visitors since there is no place for visitors to park during the week along with staying overnight, the fear of parking tickets are among all the students on campus along with visitors.
