Tuesday, January 15, 2002
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Plans
for parking garage on indefinite hold “The parking garage was discussed at the November Board of Trustees meeting, but the Board deferred any further action on it at this time,” Campbell said. “Personally, I would be surprised to see it back on the agenda again this academic year.”
Campbell said one of the reasons the Board deferred the project was because of the $5.5 million to $7.5 million price tag of the proposed parking garage. “The relatively high cost at a time when the endowment has lost market value was a major consideration,” she said. Campbell said the endowment was its highest during March 2000 at $1 billion. As of Sept. 30, the most recent quarterly figures available, the endowment was about $ 850 million, down 15 percent, she said. Campbell said the garage would also require an annual operating cost of nearly $1,000 a parking space or $450,000 to $550,000 a year. To help pay the cost, Don Mills, vice chancellor for student affairs, said there is a possibility that the garage could be incorporated into the Berry Street Initiative, a Fort Worth restoration project of the Berry Street area. “One of the things we hope is that we can work out some kind of arrangement (with Fort Worth), but that’s quite a way’s away,” Mills said. But Campbell said it was not only the garage’s cost that worried the Board. “Most of the better campuses across the country are trying to preserve green space and a pedestrian-friendly environment by locating parking on the perimeter and providing shuttle service to the center of campus,” she said. According to the TCU Parking Plan published Nov. 9, 2001 by the Facilities Department of the Physical Plant, 7,218 parking spots were available on campus. TCU Police Chief Steve McGee said 143 of those spots were lost over the holiday break as construction began on the Sarah and Steve Smith Entrepreneurs Hall just north of the M.J. Neeley School of Business building. While additional parking will not be added this semester, McGee said students should be aware of the 143 additional commuter parking spots that were added last winter behind Beasley Hall. “We actually had already added that parking last Christmas,” McGee said. “Really, it was an even trade.” McGee said the graduation of 474 students at the December Commencement will free up commuter parking this semester. Despite all the university’s efforts to better parking, Fester Prose, a senior religion major, is still not satisfied. “I’d like to see some of the people making decisions at TCU try to find a parking spot for a 10 o’clock class,” Prose said. “When I first started commuting in the fall of 1998, I could get to campus 15 minutes early and still find a spot. Last semester, I feel I couldn’t find a spot for anything.” McGee said no matter what semester it is, parking will always remain a problem. “Every year I’ve been here we always have people who are not happy with parking because we do not have enough close up spaces next to the buildings,” he said. “We have added hundreds of spaces since I have been here.” McGee said he is encouraging students to use the two commuter lots, which contain over 120 spots on Merida Street located immediately behind the TCU police station. “I have literally found that a quarter to nine, you’ll see people three deep waiting in line for (the lot behind the Moudy building), then you walk over here to (the lot behind the police station), and it will be empty,” McGee said. “They are waiting on someone to leave instead of parking (behind the police station) and could have been in their class drinking a cup of coffee 15 minutes before class started.” Kelly
Morris |
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The TCU Daily Skiff © 2002 |
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