Tight Spaces: Community Struggles with Limited Campus Parking

Reporters: Farida Ahmed & Amr Kamal

Editor: Malak El Kaddadi

As the new semester gets into high gear, students say they continue to face a critical shortage of parking spaces. Many have told The Caravan that they struggle to find a spot, and are hoping AUC is working on solutions. The Caravan staff tagged along with Malak Nowier, a Marketing senior, on September 11 at 12 noon, as she meandered from lane to lane in a bid to find a parking spot near her class.

“We are in a loop and we are all affected by one another because of the lack of structure,” Nowier said.

Long queues formed at each gate as students waited, only to find all spots taken. Cars are parking in the wrong spots and blocking lanes. The situation has become so tense that students are even following each other and speeding through turn-arounds to grab a spot.
After around 30 minutes of searching for a spot, Noweir found one spot at Gate One which is furthest from her class in the Jameel building; she reaches class 15 minutes late.

“It usually gets busier after 10am every day when most classes start,” said a member of AUC’s security personnel, who asked not to be identified.

As assembly hour approached, finding a parking spot became increasingly difficult. Tardiness can negatively affect a student’s overall performance in class. It not only affects students but could also cause staff to be late as well.

“Sometimes I’m late to my own 10 am class that I teach because of the crowded university parking,” says Mohamed Hussain, a computer science professor.

“It’s nearly impossible to find a parking spot after 9 am,” he adds. In a bid to find solutions some students resort to illegal parking.

“Actually sometimes people park in the spaces of the disabled which is unfair,” said Noweir.

“I think AUC should definitely increase the number of available parking spaces by taking advantage of the empty space found in the university parking lot,” said an AUC security member.

Like a lot of students, Nowier believes that the space allocated for the artificial lake in between Watson House and Gate 2 would serve a better purpose as an extra parking slot. Farida Sarhank, Student Union Vice President, highlighted that even seemingly available spaces, such as the area between Watson House and Gate 2 are off-limits due to underlying sewage infrastructure.

“We tried to create a parking system that recognizes when parking spots are empty and connect it to an SU app to tell students when spots are empty and when they aren’t,” explained Sarhank.

However, due to confidentiality policies, they cannot access the CCTV parking footage to create the tracking algorithm.

“We are still working on how to track empty spots in a different way,” offered Sarhank

Senior administration at AUC told The Caravan that current existing parking spaces will not be expanded; however, the campus itself is still growing, and newly constructed facilities and buildings will have their own parking areas.

Senior administration also added that when the university was first built it favored carpooling to create an environment where students get to know each other while also being aware of the carbon footprint and ef- forts to create a greener community.

In the meantime, Sarhank says the SU is looking to come up with a system to better optimize the use of existing parking spots.