Recently, several acquaintances of mine have raised issues about school parking. A recent incident involved Melissa Ballard (Sr.), whose car had the paint scraped off of it. In an unrelated incident, another car backed into her car’s bumper. No notes were left in either case. Judging by the caps lock she used when telling me about this, I could assume that she was displeased. In her words, “Not only are the parking spaces too small and at such an odd angle that you can almost never park in them, [but] the people in the parking lot are…rude and won’t let people get in and out parking spaces.” It is true that the parking lot can be rather tight and compacted. The lack of responsibility after damaging someone else’s propertyis also disturbing due to the fact that most of the time, there is no available information as to who may have hit the car and who should pay for the damages. This leaves Ballard or anyone else in this situation at an utter financial disadvantage through no fault of her own. When accidents like those that Miss Ballard has gone through take place, it seems that you will find few willing to take responsibility.
Another student, Ryan Bartlett (Sr.), has also pointed out, “Parents pull into the parking spaces in the morning, making it difficult for students to park. As a senior it is really nice to be able to drive [to school]. The problem is really the design of the parking lot and the lack of responsibility of the students and parents.” The issue of the cramped parking lot comes up again.
The students I interviewed brought to my attention that traffic in the poorly designed, cramped lot is bound to make students late for class. As Bartlett put it, “The students seem to not respect others’ cars and property and are overall inexperienced with cars and parking, leading to frustration in the parking lot.”
Considering the difficulty young drivers face when trying to adapt to such strange and bizarre circumstances in our own parking lot, some changes should be made. Security cameras should be placed at certain posts in the parking lot to capture vandals as they crash, so they can be apprehended for their actions. It is necessary that some amendments be made to the parking lot layout, allowing for more flexibility of movement. Luckily, over the summer, the layout will be re-planned and redrawn. Parking spaces will be enlarged, with the cost of only three parking spaces. The parking lots are soon to undergo immense change. With this headway, students who park in the lots in years to come will have better luck than we have.
By HESAM MODARESI
Staff Writer