Parking and Traffic Committee pumps up parking permit prices

Students who own automobiles are paying a bit more to park their vehicles in University of South Dakota parking lots this year than they have in previous years.

Annual parking passes for this year cost $138, a $12 increase from last year’s price. The increase was approved by the university’s Executive Committee after the Parking and Traffic Committee made a reccomendation in favor of raising the parking pass rate.

The parking fee is used to cover the costs of regular parking lot maintenance, including snow removal, pothole and crack repair, and parking lot replacement, according to an email from University Police Department Director Pete Jensen.

The raise in price is fairly routine, Jensen said in the email. “If costs for maintenance and upkeep of the parking lots across campus continue to rise, most likely the parking permits fees will continue to rise.”

USD has issued more than 3,200 parking passes this year. On average, about 3,800 parking passes have been issued each year for the past four years.

Some students voiced displeasure with the price increase.

“It’s irritating because we’re already broke as it is,” first-year Marissa Diede said.

Sophomore Hailey Moodie said she’d rather pay $100 for a bike than $138 for a parking pass.

“There’s never enough parking anyway,” she said.

Sophomore Mara Morill said she considers a $12 price increase to be somewhat insignificant when compared to the broad scope of college-associated fees.

“I didn’t even notice (the increase),” she said.

Parking passes may be purchased in the Business Office, which is located on the second floor of Slagle Hall.

Parking enforcement

Students, as well as community members, may also face additional charges from parking tickets, particularly when it comes to parking on or over the line for each parking space.

Vermillion Police Department Lt. Luke Trowbridge said some VPD officers have started addressing the issue of on-the-line parking around the city.

“It technically would be a violation because they’re not parking in the designated space, and I’m not opposed to us enforcing that,” he said.

VPD has seen an increase in calls in the past couple years regarding cases of vehicles being “boxed in” by another incorrectly parked car, Trowbridge said.

“That really puts a difficult strain on everybody involved there,” he said.

UPD has also been placing tickets and warnings on improperly parked cars to address the issue on campus, Jensen said.

“Depends on the situation,” he said. “If a warning is warranted, yes a warning would be issued, if not, then a parking ticket would be issued.”

UPD encourages anyone with questions about parking to go to http://www.usd.edu/administration/university-police/parking for more information.