News
Parking Rate Rage: Top Spots Break $2k
November 3, 2006 - 2:12amStudents are outraged about Cornell’s parking situation.
“I resent the fact that Cornell is ripping me off to such an astounding degree. Cornell does not seem to comprehend that it is located in rural upstate New York, not midtown Manhattan,” said Kent Michels ’07. Michels currently pays $96.61/month for on-campus parking on North Campus, while he lives on West.
Students who do not wish to pay on a month-by-month basis can purchase an annual permit for $641.10, which guarantees students a parking spot on-campus for a full year. Michels said his brother at Hamilton College pays only $50 per year, while he must suffer the “exorbitant cost of parking on campus.” In addition, Michels is not able to use his car on weekdays due to its distance from his dorm. Instead, he waits until weekends when it is more practical to make the trek.
“[Parking permits] are intentionally expensive to discourage students from bringing a car. This is a walk-able bike-able campus that has great transit services,” said David Lieb, assistant director for public information at Cornell Transportation and Mail Services.
To which Michels responds: “Besides the bus ride [to the mall] being almost interminable, who doesn’t enjoy waiting outside for a bus on a cold, rainy, miserable day in Ithaca?”
Other students who do not use on-campus parking may face even greater charges. Jason Shapiro ’07 currently pays $900 per year for parking at his off-campus residence, and premium Collegetown spots can go for over $2,000. Shapiro claims he did not research Ithaca City permits well but would not have bought one anyway due to their inconvenience.
In truth, Ithaca city residential permits may be the way to go but only for the lucky few. While Ithaca issues permits for $45/year, there are restrictions for which zones residents must live in to be eligible, according to cityofithaca.org.
Nonetheless, Shapiro and Michels could be saving a lot of money by researching off-campus options. Novarr-Mackesey, for example, a student renting company rents out parking spaces for $50/month on East State Street. Other students rent their unused off-campus parking spaces for as low as $25/month.
But most students go with the way of convenience. “[My parking spot] is right next to the house, so it’s very convenient,” Shapiro said. “I hated having to walk up and down a big hill last year.” Shapiro had to walk from his Cascadilla dorm to the parking lot in which his car was parked. Michels claims he did not research private parking options due to “laziness.”
However, even students who purchase on-campus parking permits still run the risk of being ticketed. Generally, students are unable to drive their cars to class without parking very far away. While metered spots are available throughout campus, they typically have three-hour maximums.
“I’m always nervous,” said Shapiro, who now double-checks signs after receiving a parking ticket his freshman year. He said that he got a ticket after he parked outside of Carpenter Library at 7:15 p.m. when he was only allowed to park there after 8 p.m.
A standard ticket at Cornell runs about $25. But usually, warnings are issued at the beginning of the year when students are still adjusting to the enforcements, Lieb said.
Visitors too, are not protected from Cornell’s strict parking laws. Matthew Tymann, a junior at Georgetown University also received a parking ticket. “By itself, I thought the ticket was pretty fair. However, I’ve visited Cornell a few times and I always have issues with parking. Everything seems to be reserved for some specific group, and I’m never sure where is actually open to visitors.”
Visitor passes actually cost $8/day to park in the parking garage on Hoy Road, according to Lieb. He also said that there is generally no free parking on campus during business hours, aside from the 10-minute drop off zones.
People seem to expect there to be sufficient parking because Cornell is a rural campus.
Tymann, for example appears to share Michels’ sentiment: “If it were a city campus, I could understand it more, but on the vast expanse that is Cornell, I would think there’d be sufficient room for people to park.”
Actually, Cornell does appear to have limited space. According to Lieb, Cornell has about 10,000 spots, 6,500 of which are used for day-to-day services. Cornell works to “protect those spaces,” Lieb said, as they are necessary for commuter students and faculty. However, daily transgressions occur from students, faculty, and staff alike.
“We do as much as we can in terms of educating people.” Lieb said that information about parking is sent out to students, especially freshman so that they may have better knowledge about their options.
But to some like Michels, who hold a relentless grudge, this is simply not enough. “I plan to deduct [these costs] from future alumni donations. [Cornell is] not getting a cent from me.”
Just park illegally on
Just park illegally on campus. The % chance you actually get a ticket in the larger lots is low, and the actual punishment (typically $15-$25) isn't going to break the bank. The fact is that you can get away with parking on campus without a permit for as little as around $200/month.
Parking - Corrections
A couple of minor corrections.
Visitor permits are $10 per day.
It is correct that some metered parking areas are limited to short-term parking (behind Willard Straight Hall at an hour and 45 minutes, or Helen Newman at three hours,for example). Other metered areas such as those in B lot, adjacent to Appel Commons, and across Tower Road from the Dairy Bar are available for all-day metered parking.
Little known facts
Also, I'd like to add a couple of little known facts to this article. The first is that including such factors as debt service (interest on construction loans) and maintenance, it costs the University on average $1000 per space per year to provide parking on campus. Therefore, everyone who purchases a parking permit from the University is being heavily subsidized by Cornell. There are over 250 different surface parking lots on campus, plus one parking garage.
In order to build parking that mitigates storm-water runoff, captures the toxins that drip off of and out of cars, to light and landscape lots, and to build appropriate and safe circulation and accessways, it costs the University at least $7,500 to build each surface parking space. Spaces in above-ground structures can cost $25,000 per space or more. The costs to build underground parking would exceed $35,000 per space, perhaps $75,000 per space or more in areas which would require the blasting of bedrock (which is close to the surface in most areas of the campus).
The parking enforcement program does not generate revenue for the University either. It is self-supporting, the fines pay for the program, which includes staffing the information and parking booths at the entrances to campus. We provide enforcement as a customer service to protect parking spaces for those individuals who pay for parking permits.
Response to Mr. Lieb
It's interesting that all the arguments made by Mr. Lieb for why parking is expensive at Cornell should apply to every campus equally across the country. To the common knowledge, there is nothing unique about Cornell that makes it any more expensive to maintain the parking system here than at any other campus, yet many other campuses maintain their parking fees at a reasonable rate. I'd be interested to know what makes this situation unique to Cornell. I would hazard a guess that Cornell is just unwilling to subsidize the parking situation further as many other schools choose to do.
Get over it!
Cheap parking is not a basic entitlement. I never had a car at Cornell the four years I was there and always managed to get by. Use your feet or get a bike.
The funny thing is that
The funny thing is that Cornell tells students they don't need a car, yet all the employees and faculty have cars. What's even more interesting is that they've saved all the best spots for themselves. This article should have mentioned that not only has the price for visitor permits increased, but the number of spaces has drastically decreased. Just this semester Cornell removed probably around 50-100 visitor spaces near Barton hall and other locations to provide more parking for non-visitor/non-student interests.
Cornell simply doesn't care about student parking, and they don't see any problem with that. They provide enough parking for themselves, and leave students with one of three options, either 1) don't bring a car 2) bring a car, pay a lot of money, and park far away, or 3) bring your car, and deal with the free market economics in collegetown, paying up to $2000 a year. Is that fair? It depends on what you think, if you think that people with more money should be the only ones able to have cars while attending Cornell, then the current system is fine.
To address the comment regarding Cornell's cost of building and maintaining spaces, of course some permit fee is appropriate to justify that. However, let's not forget the Cornell charges this thing called tuition to all students. Tuition is this large sum of money which many students borrow in order to pay for a Cornell education. This sum of money covers many things, including facility upkeep and parking. So when you say Cornell subsidizes parking, what you're really saying is Cornell students subsidize parking. Cornell's money doesn't just appear, it's either comming from students, the state or federal government, or generous benefactors.
I don't believe for a second
I don't believe for a second the university's numbers that it costs $1,000 per year to maintain each space, just like I don't believe the bs that all universities feed us when they say that our tuition doesn't actually cover the cost of the education. In this instance, perhaps if Cornell stopped capitulating to the unions with their ridiculous entitlements.
Parking Rates
For the record, employees and faculty have to pay for parking. Since many of us don't live on or near campus, we have to drive. Many employees walk, carpool, bicycle or take the bus to work to save money. Many park in the A-lot and take a bus to work from there.
Any entitlements seem to be expected by the people wanting to park for free. I pay $310 per year to park at Wilson Lab, even though I may be called in at any time of year, day or night. Many staff work non-standard hours as demanded by the job, but are not given any parking consideration, even though carpooling and buses are not as likely to be found at 4 am.
The best spots may be saved for somebody, but in general they are not saved for Cornell employees, and certainly not for those students privileged enough to own a car while attending school.
I too doubt the $1,000 fee -
I too doubt the $1,000 fee - at that rate how could parking garages priced well below that be profitable? 'Organic' concrete perhaps?
It's not a free market in Collegetown - Ithaca restricts what can be built and parked where. If the city of Ithaca makes it hard (expensive and bureaucratic) to build a parking lot, the cost of a parking spot will reflect that (just as apartments in Manhattan do). In Soviet Ithaca, parking permit buys YOU!
Next time someone complains about the high cost of housing, tell them that zoning restrictions are largely responsible for it.
Parking is expensive on most college campuses
The estimate of $1000 per space to maintain parking lots is fairly common. It really does cost a lot. Parking is a problem on every college campus - Cornell is more expensive than some places, cheaper than others. And no one on any campus is happy with the parking situation. Freshman at Stanford cannot even have cars. And when Cornell tried to build more parking, the Redbud Woods incident ensued. So there are no easy answers.