Lot B1 on the Brownsville campus filled quickly last week, making it difficult for students to find parking. DANIELA MARTINEZ SALAZAR/THE RIDER
A combination of a boom in in-person classes following the COVID-19 pandemic and the largest freshman class in UTRGV history has led to the fueling of the fire of an already major concern regarding UTRGV, parking on campus.
“From home to getting to class is about 40 minutes,” said Lorena Torres, a criminal justice major who lives in San Juan. “The drive is 20.”
English graduate student Daniella Arredondo said there is not enough parking for students.
“You’re going to admit so many students and not have enough parking,” Arredondo said. “That’s ridiculous.”
The Rider asked over 15 students if the parking situation caused them to make adjustments to their schedule. Every student said that it had.
“I need to start leaving my house at 6:30,” psychology senior Jessica Anaya said. “I check my phone and it says it will take 40 minutes, but as you’re driving, more traffic is coming in. So, there’s really no way to calculate how long I am going to drive.”
These concerns have always been prominent at UTRGV, but construction on both the Edinburg and Brownsville campuses has made this situation more chaotic.
In Brownsville, the Center for Human Genetics is under construction in Lot B-2, decreasing the number of available parking spaces.
According to an Aug. 29 email from the university, Schunior Street is indefinitely closed for construction between Sugar Road and Nevarez Drive.
“Construction has made it more difficult to have people get access to the parking lots near the baseball field,” said UTRGV Police Lt. Esmeralda Guerra.
Parking Services Director Pablo Aguilar agrees.
“Construction does create more congestion and more delays,” Aguilar said.
Unfortunately, construction on the Edinburg campus that has closed off much of Schunior Street is a concern that is here to stay, according to Guerra.
“We reached out to the City of Edinburg and they said [construction would be] probably another six months,” she said.
An outdated sign before the intersection of Schunior Street and North Sixth Avenue states that construction ran from May 20 to Aug. 20.
As the campus deals with the construction situation, the Parking and Transportation Department has provided suggestions to students on how to best navigate parking on campus.
The most emphasis was given to the VOLT line, which travels through parking lots to pick up students and take them closer to the main campus.
“VOLT is available during the peak hours,” Aguilar said. “Parking [is] a little bit further, but [students are] finding the value of not losing time to find parking spaces.”
Some students, however, disagree.
“How do you calculate how much time it is going to take you to catch a VOLT?” Anaya said.
“You’d be wasting more time waiting for the VOLT than it takes to walk to class,” Arrendondo said.
The Parking and Transportation Department and UTRGV Police strongly advise students to adjust their schedules to avoid leaving campus at the peak hours of traffic.
“After a couple of weeks, I think everybody says, you know, I am going to stay a little later or leave a little earlier and they do tend to adjust,” Guerra said.
“As the semester progresses, I think it is going to become more manageable, easier for students and that is what we are shooting for, hoping for,” Aguilar said.
While the parking situation on campus may become less intense over time, students are upset. A Change.org petition, created by UTRGV student Anais Martinez, has reached nearly 1,000 signatures.
Among the concerns listed on the petition are the lack of parking spaces and the cost of parking permits.
“Honestly, I am just trying to get to work or I am just trying to get to class and I do not care where I park,” Arredondo said. “It defeats the purpose of having a parking pass.”
“It is not fair to give tickets [for parking in the wrong zone] when students cannot find parking,” said one student who asked to remain anonymous. “Most people who are doing that are just trying to get to classes on time.”
The Parking and Transportation Department understands these concerns, but still feels that the university’s parking prices have value, Aguilar said.
Annual UTRGV student parking permits cost $40 for evening passes, $60 for Zone 1 and $100 for Zone 2.
“We are still far below the [parking pricing] rate of any comparable universities,” Aguilar said. “We are in a big university … and this is something that goes along the lines of being a part of something so big and so awesome.”
Asked about plans to address the situation, Aguilar replied there are some short-term goals for the university in the upcoming weeks.
“We will continue to try to make students aware of the existence of remote parking and utilize those remote parking lots and notify students about the VOLT services and their reliability in remote areas,” he said.
As for long-term goals, Aguilar mentioned the creation of a study to evaluate parking on campus.
“The parking study … is this semester, it is ongoing and the results are expected to come out in Spring 2023,” he said. “We’ll be able to review it to determine the next steps.”
While the Parking and Transportation Department conducts the study, the campus community is dealing with the situation.
“Our start time for work is 9, so I have to leave my house at 6:30 a.m. … to sit in traffic for an hour,” said the anonymous student who is from the Pharr-San Juan-Alamo area.
“I’ve heard about traffic, I’ve heard a lot of complaints about traffic,” said David Arevalo, a marketing student.
English graduate student Emma Guerra said, “In one of my graduate courses, a student emailed a professor to say that they were going to be over 30 minutes late because there was traffic and then there was no parking.”
