Every academic year at colleges across the nation, parking becomes the bane of everyone’s existence, especially at colleges with a higher first-year class, like Hamline University.

When it comes to the challenges of college students and faculty, parking on campus is high on the list, whether you attend a small or a huge college. Students and faculty on campus can purchase one of the six parking permits or register their car with Hamline’s Office of Public Safety if they choose not to buy a parking permit. With that being said, with this year’s class of First-years being the largest since pre-COVID-19, it does make things a little trickier.

Parking Permits and Registration

Hamline Public Safety (HPS) has parking permits that all faculty, staff and students are eligible to purchase; A student surface lot pass, which costs $292 a year, and a student Apartments garage pass, which costs $533 a year. However, having a parking permit does not guarantee you a spot in the three surface lots or the Hamline Apartments garage.. Like many students, I have bought a parking pass just to be able to park in the lots. That being said, while Hamline does have more than just the main three parking lots, the other lots aren’t as close to the main buildings where students have their classes.

Students who choose not to purchase a parking pass are only able to park on the streets and because of that reason they arrive to campus earlier just to find a spot on the street to park that’s closer not only to campus but also the building they have their first class in.

Many students and faculty try to be on campus by 9:00 in the morning just to be able to have a parking spot within the Lots, or if all the nearby lots are filled, find a spot on the street to park. For many students, this has been a part of their everyday routine since their first year at Hamline; however, it does make it hard when students have classes that don’t start till after 9:00 and have to drive to campus earlier just to have a place to park.

Parking Lots

When it comes to the different parking lots on campus, Public Safety lists ten different parking lots on the University’s website, ranging from Lot A to Lot G. While there are different lots, the most common lot students tend to park in are Lot B through E because of their closeness to the main buildings where students and faculty have their classes.

Lots E and B are listed as parking lots for both The Hamline Apartments (Lot E) and Drew Residence Hall (Lot B), which means that a few rows of those parking lots are dedicated to overnight parking for the students who live in the residence hall and apartments.

Lot C also has reserved lots, but for a different reason. Over the summer, the undergraduate admissions team moved from their admissions house on Snelling Ave. to the Giddens /Alumni Learning Center (GLC). As a result, the first row of parking in Lot C is reserved for prospective Pipers, minus the handicapped parking, which students noticed when returning to campus and in an email from Inside Hamline on Sept. 29.

This year’s class of first-years was not the start of parking on Hamline’s campus becoming a huge problem; it has shown how this has been an issue before, and we are now seeing the effects of it because we now have more students than we do parking spaces available. There are not enough spots to park on the street near campus, either, as there are many residential houses that have driveways, so it cuts into the spaces where students and faculty can potentially park their cars to go to class.

Possible Effects and Solutions

One possible solution to help with parking on campus is carpooling, which would be great because it would open up more parking spots on campus. However, this presents the issue of finding other people with matching schedules and commutes.

On-campus parking will remain an issue, not only for us Pipers, but also at colleges across the country. This will be an ongoing issue that students, both new and current, will face and have to think about as each new year brings more and more students. So, the next time you are driving to campus and complaining about the parking, just know that many students and faculty also have to deal with the same issue.