Finding a parking spot on campus poses problems for students once again as the spring semester begins. Students at Cal Poly Pomona struggle daily to find a spot due to the limited amount of parking spaces available on campus.
According to the CPP website, there are just over 26,000 students and 2,000 faculty and staff members. CPP offers several different lots to park in, with a total of over 14,000 parking spots, as previously reported by The Poly Post in Issue 1 (Sept. 10, 2019). This is a major inconvenience considering only 9,000 of those spaces are general parking for students, while the rest are for faculty, staff, disabled and residential students. Clearly, there is not enough space for everyone.
Mary Zaarour, a fourth-year psychology student, explains how she has been having a hard time with parking since she transferred to CPP in the fall of 2018. “It (parking) is very impacted and the thought of it stresses me out,” Zaarour said. “I have to come hours before my class starts just to find a spot to park. I have even been late to classes a few times due to the lack of available spaces.”
(Carla Ghafari | The Poly Post)
According to the CPP website, the peak traffic times to arrive on campus are Monday through Thursday between 7:30 a.m. and 10 a.m.
Parking Structure 1, found east of Voorhis Alumni Park and west of Police and Parking Services (Building 109), and Parking Structure 2, which is found southeast of iPoly High School, are the top two most popular places to park at CPP. Parking Structure 1 has around 2,200 spots, while Parking Structure 2 has about 1,600.
Zaarour is not the only one showing up late to class because of the parking problem. Lilly Lopez, a fourth-year finance student has experienced similar challenges. “I feel like there should be more parking structures. I have been late to not only some classes, but to exams too because of parking,” Lopez said. Like Zaarour and Lopez, many students are frustrated with this situation and hope that additional parking lots or structures will be built to eliminate this complication.
“We have not received complaints about not having enough parking space,” said a representative from Parking & Transportation Services. “We have two overflow lots, as well as a lot on Corporate Center Drive with shuttles running almost every 15 minutes.”
Parking & Transportation Services highly recommend that students use the two overflow lots in order to avoid driving around. The Bronco Shuttle has five routes, A-E, all running during school hours to help students get to campus from the overflow lots. For a full list of the Bronco Shuttle hours and routes, visit https://www.cpp.edu/transportation/commuting-to-campus/bronco-shuttle.shtml.
As stated on the CPP website, hundreds of new students are admitted to CPP each year. With a larger demand for parking spaces, campus police usually try to help direct students with traffic in the mornings, Monday through Thursday.
As the semester goes on and the first few weeks have passed, traffic on campus has slightly decreased; however, finding parking remains a daily struggle for students.
