College plans new parking lot to open in fall 2007

By: Michelle Anstett
Editor-in-chief

If everything goes through the Monmouth City zoning board correctly, students will have more parking options of the 2007-2008 school year.

According to Don Gladfelter, vice president for finance and business, Monmouth College has purchased a lot, approximately half a city block in area, off Euclid Avenue. The lot, which currently contains a vacant nursing home which has been on the market for nearly seven years, will hopefully be razed and a parking lot for students will be constructed in its place.

The potential lot was prematurely announced on the Monmouth College message boards and in fliers placed in student mailboxes recently, but all those announcements had to be pulled, as the lot has not been fully approved by the city.

Currently, the college has a basic layout for the potential parking lot drawn up, and moving ahead on the project is still at least six weeks away. It is trying to get the proposal placed on the agenda of the city planning commission for April, but nothing will be fully decided until at least the middle of May.

If approved, the new lot will add approximately 130 new parking spaces, a massive improvement for a campus on which parking is a major problem and concern of students.

City approval, however, is not the only concern faced by those planning the new lot, as “parking’s very expensive to build,” Gladfelter stated. The ballpark figure for what this new lot will cost is approximately $6,000 per space, but that is not simply the cost of pouring a slab of concrete.

Gladfelter continued that a parking lot has a lot of extraneous costs, such as the cost of cleaning out an area, running wire for electricity for lights, making sure drainage works properly and paying wages to the workers. The cost could be a lot lower than it is, if the college decided to simply create a plain concrete parking lot, but “we try to do parking lots that are semi-attractive… if parking lots can be attractive,” he commented.

The area between the lot on Euclid Avenue and Sixth Street may also need some sidewalk work, Gladfelter added, as the sidewalks in that area are not ideal.

The money to pay for this new endeavor will not come from nowhere, however, as parking rates for next year have been raised. Currently existing campus lots will go from a cost of $35 per semester, or $70 per year, to $75 per semester, or $150 per year. Parking passes for Founders’ Village will continue to come with the cost of an apartment. The new lot will cost $35 per semester, or $70 per year. The price is lower since the new lot will be less convenient for student use.

Originally, Gladfelter said, the new lot was intended for use for freshmen parking, leaving the on-campus lots open for sophomores and upperclassmen. However, some school officials believed seniors or other current students may decide they want to park in this new lot, so the college is currently handling sign up for the lot on a first-come-first-served basis.

At the moment, everything is looking good for the future of a new parking lot on Euclid Avenue, so the line of cars along Sixth Street may get a little smaller in the upcoming school year.