As the University and its East Side neighbors struggle to find solutions for the dearth of parking on College Hill, a Herald poll conducted earlier this month found that students with cars would continue to bring them to College Hill - even if parking is pushed further off campus.
According to the poll results, 11.4 percent of Brown students currently keep a car on campus. Of those, 39.8 percent said that they would use off-campus parking with a shuttle service to campus - a solution that has long been considered by the University - if it was the only available option. Only 3.6 percent of students said they would be not bring a car because of off-campus parking, while 41 percent said that they would find an alternative way to park their car on campus.
The Herald poll was conducted from Nov. 5-7 and has a 3.9 percent margin of error with 95 percent confidence. A total of 621 Brown undergraduates completed the poll, which was administered as a written questionnaire to students in the University Post Office in Faunce House and in the Sciences Library. The margin of error for questions addressed to students with cars was 10.7 percent with 95 percent confidence because of the smaller number of respondents with cars.
The shortage of parking is especially pressing as the University prepares for the construction of the new Nelson Fitness Center at the site of the parking lot adjacent to the Olney-Margolies Athletic Center - a project that will destroy several hundred parking spaces, said Elizabeth Gentry, director of business and financial services, who oversees University parking.
The construction of the Nelson Fitness Center will reduce the number of on-campus spaces below the number the University has committed to in the Institutional Master Plan that it submits to the city. Because of this, "we can't even get a building permit (for the Center) without addressing parking," Gentry said.
To address the impending parking shortage, Brown has joined with other educational institutions, neighborhood associations and government entities to form a parking task force, Gentry said. The task force, established last year, "is looking on a comprehensive basis at the whole (parking) situation ... to identify solutions that accommodate the most number of number of people that want to park on College Hill," she said.
Though the committee has not made any official recommendations and is unlikely to do so until early next spring, moving student parking off campus to the Jewelry District or another location already on Brown's shuttle route is a likely solution. Gentry said the University must find 200 to 250 new spots, which closely matches the number of students who currently pay the University to park on campus.
Still, the parking shortage is "about more than just parking," Gentry said. Brown is using "supply and demand management" to find ways to reduce the demand for cars on campus. Gentry cited the recent implementation of Rhode Island Public Transit Authority's U-PASS program, which allows Brown ID holders to ride all RIPTA buses and trolleys for free, as a successful example of reducing demand for cars on campus. She also suggested that finding a balance between parking fees for on-campus parking and supporting other alternatives like carpooling and biking can also decrease the demand for parking.
"We know it is an issue, but the fact of the matter is that we are in an urban setting," Gentry said. "You have certain restrictions on how much (parking) you can provide ... so we are working to make it so that a car is not needed on campus."
Students interviewed by The Herald generally agreed that a car is not required to get around College Hill.
A car "is a nice convenience to have, but it is not a necessity," said Mallory Taub '08. Though she has had a car on campus since her sophomore year, Taub said she mainly uses it to get weekly groceries and to travel to her home in rural Vermont, which is not easily accessible by public transportation.
Taub, who parked in a private space her sophomore year and in a Brown lot her junior and senior years, said she was unsure that a plan to move parking off campus would be successful in reducing parking around campus.
"I usually use my car when I am in a hurry," she said. A car "wouldn't be useful if I had to take a shuttle to get to it."
Despite the inconvenience, Taub cited the environmental benefits of decreasing the number of cars on campus as a reason the change might be positive.
Andrew Jacobs '08 described the move to off-campus parking as "an unfortunate necessity."
"It will be great to have an awesome gym ... and part of what's great about Providence is its narrow streets," Jacobs said. "But that means that parking is going to be a problem."
Jacobs, who has parked in private spaces for the last two years, said he would consider using the off-campus parking with a shuttle, if the price made up for the inconvenience.
Gentry said addressing student concerns is important in deciding how to alleviate the College Hill parking crunch, adding that she hopes to form a committee with student, faculty and staff members to discuss potential solutions.
"We don't have a choice," Gentry said. "We have to get this (issue) out there and moving."
