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Campus parking plight

Opinion

Parking on SAIT campus sucks. There, I said it.

Now I’ll go even further by saying that attempting to park anywhere even remotely close to SAIT is an adventure in misery and letdown.

Let me recount my parking experiences here thus far.

I pulled my first major mistake in the opening week of my program when my attention span was dominated by thoughts of new instructors and classmate details, buying textbooks and memorizing my locker code.

Little did I know, the smarter, faster and wealthier of my peers were snapping up all the available parking spots on campus.

When I meandered up to the parking services wicket a full week after classes had commenced, it was clear from the looks on the parking ladies’ faces that I had a snowball’s chance in hell of getting a spot anywhere near SAIT asphalt.

Not to be discouraged, I set about looking for craftier places to rest my car for the day.

My first stop was the Sears parking lot. I had heard from the others that it was a mecca for students looking to beat the system.

From the sheer volume of rusty and beat-up cars piled in the lot, it was clear that other students were on to the idea. That is, until we were captured by the Sears’ security guy.

On the day I was captured by the parking guy, I was elated to learn I could actually purchase a spot there. “You mean I can assure myself a monthly spot here for a fee of $50?” I said.

“Yes,” he said. “But you can’t buy a pass until the 15th of next month, so go on and don’t come back ‘til the 15th.”

At this juncture in my parking adventure, I discovered the community of Rosedale that sits conveniently on the other side of 10th Street. A $40 dollar ticket from the City of Calgary followed soon after, and I was ousted again.

You might be asking at this point why I didn’t just bite the bullet and opt to take public transit, but I beg you to consider this.
As a result of my part-time job, I often work well into the evening. The last thing I want to do after a 16-hour day on campus is wait in the freezing dark for a bus to pick me up.

And so, after two months of trials and tribulations, I became a proud Sears parking pass holder for the month of November.
Now I get to drive around the allotted 200 stalls with the rest of the sheep and look for that one glorious open parking stall to welcome me into its loving stripes.

Each day as I battle my classmates for that one open spot, I thank SAIT for being such an educational and forward-thinking institution.

With surveys showing that Calgary has the second-highest monthly downtown parking rates in North America – second only to New York City – and the Calgary Parking Authority currently looking for city approval to raise parking fines even higher, at least SAIT students can rest assured that our polytechnic is truly preparing us for the real world of Calgary parking.

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