It’s your first semester of college, the least of your concerns should be paying parking tickets, right? It seems that this isn’t the case, as droves of first year students are parking in faculty-only spaces.
The Southwestern Police Department urges students to “Park Green, Be Seen” with a new outreach program aimed at making students more familiar with the parking restrictions.
“A lot of the first-year students… I mean we really push the information, but unfortunately a lot of them still don’t seem to understand exactly where they can and can’t park,” SUPD Chief Brad Dunn said. “We did this to give them a visual example.”
Parking decals are issued in the SUPD headquarters located in the Old Field House. Once acquired, they must be placed in the lower left corner of the car’s back windshield. The fine for parking without a decal is $125.
Student parking is denoted with a green line, while faculty parking has a white line. Students are only allowed in parking spaces with a green line – not white faculty parking or visitor parking. The fine for parking incorrectly is $50.
“We’re just trying to reduce the number of students that have to pay tickets, because they hate it,” Dunn said. “I don’t blame them.”
Hopefully, as the semester continues, students will begin parking in the correct places.