Rutgers University Newark Fixes Its Own Parking Problem
According to the Senior Director of the Rutgers Department of Transportation Jack Molenaar, Rutgers has made significant improvements to the Newark campus parking situation after several years of complaints from both students and faculty. Students are now guaranteed parking on campus if they purchase a permit.
Two new types of permits, a premium parking deck permit on sale for $600 and a surface lot permit on sale for $165, have replaced the old permits that were available for the semester and school year. As of Fall 2017, the amount of the new premium deck permits sold was the same as the amount of stalls available, also accounting for resident permit holders. Surface lot permits guarantee students parking in any of the open parking lots on campus. An additional parking structure is currently under construction for the Honors Living Learning Community, which is expected to provide an additional 250-300 stalls, and overflow lots with access to the Campus Connect shuttle service that brings students to the main campus have been opened.
“The complaints, as the semester went on, just disappeared,” said Molenaar.
According to statistics provided by the Department of Transportation, there are over 2,000 parking spaces available to Newark students who have purchased the parking pass. The premium deck permit allows access to decks 1 and 2, both of which are central to the Newark campus. The surface lot allows students access to the lots on Eagle St., Orange St., New St., Lock St., and the Norfolk deck. The Campus Connect shuttle service that brings students to the main campus area has had a 90% on-time arrival rate, with 1% of arrivals being early and 9% late.
“We’re not oversold yet on parking. There is, technically, a spot for everybody that has a permit right now,” Peter Englot, Senior Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs at Rutgers University, commented.
The Norfolk deck, used for overflow parking from the surface lots, has seen up to 97 student swipes a day, meaning at least 97 students that could not find parking at the surface lots or main decks were able to park there successfully.
Two new types of permits, a premium parking deck permit on sale for $600 and a surface lot permit on sale for $165, have replaced the old permits that were available for the semester and school year. As of Fall 2017, the amount of the new premium deck permits sold was the same as the amount of stalls available, also accounting for resident permit holders. Surface lot permits guarantee students parking in any of the open parking lots on campus. An additional parking structure is currently under construction for the Honors Living Learning Community, which is expected to provide an additional 250-300 stalls, and overflow lots with access to the Campus Connect shuttle service that brings students to the main campus have been opened.
“The complaints, as the semester went on, just disappeared,” said Molenaar.
According to statistics provided by the Department of Transportation, there are over 2,000 parking spaces available to Newark students who have purchased the parking pass. The premium deck permit allows access to decks 1 and 2, both of which are central to the Newark campus. The surface lot allows students access to the lots on Eagle St., Orange St., New St., Lock St., and the Norfolk deck. The Campus Connect shuttle service that brings students to the main campus area has had a 90% on-time arrival rate, with 1% of arrivals being early and 9% late.
“We’re not oversold yet on parking. There is, technically, a spot for everybody that has a permit right now,” Peter Englot, Senior Vice Chancellor of Public Affairs at Rutgers University, commented.
The Norfolk deck, used for overflow parking from the surface lots, has seen up to 97 student swipes a day, meaning at least 97 students that could not find parking at the surface lots or main decks were able to park there successfully.
“I knew that deck had hundreds of vacant stalls, so I was like ‘Well, why aren’t we using this?’” remarked Englot, emphasizing that students should seek out a timely, predictable trip straight to a facility like Norfolk where they know parking will be readily available instead of heading straight to deck 1, which usually reaches capacity first.
Jack Molenaar himself went to the New. St. lot to observe its status, and wound up accompanying students that had been searching for a parking spot at the crowded lot for more than 30 minutes to the Norfolk deck. He then showed them how to ride the shuttle back to the main campus. Many, he mentioned, did not know about the deck.
When considering the increase in demand that having a streamlined parking procedure in effect could produce, the officials responded with information on the Rutgers University Transportation Master Planning committee, which has created a master plan to account for the increased demand in parking and public transportation needs. The plan, set to be finalized by the spring of 2017, will set a precedent on how the university will manage demand over the next 15 to 20 years.
“As a planner, I know that there’s induced demand. That’s why having this problem for years has forced people to use transit which is good for Rutgers University,” said Molenaar, indicating that students that are able to use public transportation should.
“We wanted to, in a certain sense, inhibit demand by incentivizing people to take public transportation, so we created a rewards plan,” remarked Englot, speaking in reference to the Student Commuter Reward Program. The program rewards students who take public transportation with a monthly gift card for up to $50 to a variety of stores from the Rutgers Kite+Key store, Starbucks, or Barnes & Noble.
Officials say that negotiations with NJ Transit may be in the future for Rutgers University as a whole. Ideas like valet parking have also been acknowledged by university planners as a prospective implementation, but they have not been able to develop a model that would work.
“There’s a lot of thought and a lot of energy and a lot of time that’s gone into thinking about how to manage the limited resources we have for parking,” Englot said.
Jack Molenaar himself went to the New. St. lot to observe its status, and wound up accompanying students that had been searching for a parking spot at the crowded lot for more than 30 minutes to the Norfolk deck. He then showed them how to ride the shuttle back to the main campus. Many, he mentioned, did not know about the deck.
When considering the increase in demand that having a streamlined parking procedure in effect could produce, the officials responded with information on the Rutgers University Transportation Master Planning committee, which has created a master plan to account for the increased demand in parking and public transportation needs. The plan, set to be finalized by the spring of 2017, will set a precedent on how the university will manage demand over the next 15 to 20 years.
“As a planner, I know that there’s induced demand. That’s why having this problem for years has forced people to use transit which is good for Rutgers University,” said Molenaar, indicating that students that are able to use public transportation should.
“We wanted to, in a certain sense, inhibit demand by incentivizing people to take public transportation, so we created a rewards plan,” remarked Englot, speaking in reference to the Student Commuter Reward Program. The program rewards students who take public transportation with a monthly gift card for up to $50 to a variety of stores from the Rutgers Kite+Key store, Starbucks, or Barnes & Noble.
Officials say that negotiations with NJ Transit may be in the future for Rutgers University as a whole. Ideas like valet parking have also been acknowledged by university planners as a prospective implementation, but they have not been able to develop a model that would work.
“There’s a lot of thought and a lot of energy and a lot of time that’s gone into thinking about how to manage the limited resources we have for parking,” Englot said.
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