 Hello, everyone. We are here with David Wilson, who is the communications director at Transit and Parking and we're talking all things Transit and Parking. David, do you want to get us started? Sure. I appreciate everyone tuning in. You may have questions as we go. Please send those in and we'll try to address those that we can. First, I want to tell you we're in the conference room at the Transit and Parking Department. If you want to know where we're at on campus, we're right across the street from the basketball arena that is one of the premier basketball arenas in the conference. So we're easy to find if you ever need to, but this year things are a little different as you might understand. We wanted to start today by referring to a map of our campus and it shows all the parking areas. Now this is available on our website. If you go to parking.uark.edu, you'll find this quite easily and it's always updated. But basically, if you're a student, you'll have a few choices and many of you have been through this, but you could possibly be one of the fortunate ones who gets a garage permit, or you may get to park in the resident reserve and that is indicated by the red shaded areas. Those are usually closest to the residence halls. So some of you, like I said, have been through this drill. You may be notified even now that you're one of those who gets a permit in that area, so you'll want to be mindful of that. Some of you, it's much more affordable for the majority of our students to get a green permit and you can see there are several areas that will hold green permits. We don't really run out of green permits to sell. There's many of people who need one. We can sell one of those to you. The most affordable option is not for everybody, but some students have found that they like to get into Lot 99, which is our orange. It's a commuter permit. It serves a lot of people who may not live on campus, but some students who do live on campus, they may want their car here, but they don't want to use it very often. They just want to make sure it's here, so you can park it down here and leave it. It's a well-lit area. It's served by Racerback Transit. Even if you take your car down here and want to park it, you can hop on a bus and get back to the main part of campus. So like I said, that's not for everyone, but for some people they really like that arrangement. So those are some things for you to consider. Like I said, this map is online. You may want to look at it later. I have some other comments that I want to share with you. I think that we're going to just sit around the table and try to talk informally today. And it looks like we have about 26 people with us right now. Everybody can comment and tell us where they're from while we go over these questions. It sounds like the more the merrier. We like to hear from you. We don't want to do all of the talking, so you're welcome to contact us at any time. And while we're on that topic, forgive me, I'm still getting used to a mask, there's different ways to contact us. And one way that you can call our office is simply 575-PARK, P-A-R-K. Of course the area code is 479. If you need us for any reason in the office, you can call there. You can also follow us on social media. We're on Twitter and on Facebook and on Instagram, so we hope that you will follow us there. We try to put some announcements out there when it's needed. You could email us at parknet.uark.edu. So you may want to jot that down. I'll say it again. P-A-R-K-N-E-T.edu. And in this day and age, in a normal year we would just say, come on by the office, we'll help you. But everyone understands this year, just like everywhere else, because of some coronavirus concerns, we're doing things a little bit differently. We do have people in our office, but it's a skeleton crew. We do have people in our front counter, but they are set up to handle specific cases, like if you're dealing with ADA parking, or if you need motorcycle permit, some of those can't be done online. But almost everything else can be done online, and if you need to call us, you can. So we hope that you will. We want to provide the best service we can in light of the circumstances that we all face. Great, and it looks like we have Barbara from New York with us today. New York? Yeah. Great. Welcome to the University of Arkansas, virtually speaking. We're glad that you're tuned in. I will say, and I can make a couple of more comments, I think most of our audience is incoming students, brand new students, freshmen. You may have a lot of questions and that's okay. We're here to help you through that. I could give you a couple of hints as you get started, and you can think about this. When you get to campus, if you have a vehicle, there will be times, and we all understand this, there's going to be times when maybe you don't have a class and you and some friends are going to go somewhere in town and maybe come back, and maybe you have an afternoon class that you need to get to. You may come back to campus and find out that where you're usually parking, maybe that's full at that moment, and you'll need to hunt for another place. Just be careful that you always park where your permit grants you access. Now we have noticed in the past, sometimes you may be with a friend or a roommate, and they'll say, it's okay to park there. Go ahead, there's no problem. Except your friend or your roommate, they don't really work for transit and parking, so they might give you some information that isn't accurate, and then you end up with a citation. We don't want you to have a citation, but sometimes that happens. So just be careful, be mindful about where you should be with your vehicle, and you can avoid that issue. If my friend says, they told me I could park here, we can't bring that to you and say that we get out of our ticket? We hear that a lot, but we really operate on the basis that, and everybody here, no matter if they're 18 years old or older, that is an adult, and we try to let everybody handle things as an adult, and we kind of expect everybody to know where their permit allows them to be. So we do get that excuse. Somebody told me that I could park here, and that really doesn't work. Sometimes the somebody who's providing the info, they may not be steering you correctly in that regard. Also, I want to say this, when you're on campus, if you're living in a residence hall, this is a big campus, and you may have a class that's all the way on the other side of campus. Now, if you're new, and forgive me, I'm still struggling with the mask, but if you are new on campus, you may be tempted to hop in your car and think, well, I can park in another lot on the other side of campus, and I'll get closer to my class, and that doesn't always work. It's better just to walk across campus, or you could hop on a bus, one of the Razorback Transit buses, they stop at various places on campus. The only reason we don't recommend you driving to class is because when the commuters are coming here, and we're up and running, it's almost like a small city, and you will sometimes end up late for class because you're spending more time looking for a parking space somewhere else. So, if you have a good spot where your vehicle is parked and it's time to go to class, it's best just to walk to class and get there and not worry about making your life more complicated. Sophie, you were a student here for many years. Did you ever drive around looking for parking? I did. I actually never had a parking pass, so I would either always have to pay in Harman or Garland, try to rely on my friends for rides, or I really worked my calf muscles by walking. A lot of students end up doing that. Like I said, it is a big campus, but it'll work out. You just need some time to get used to it. Let me say this, you don't want to do like my daughter did. She graduated here more than a year ago, and she handled her own parking situation, even though her dad worked right here. She took care of her business, but when she approached her senior year, she was doing student teaching. She didn't have to be on campus very much. I think she had one evening class, and she was telling me when the year started she didn't think she needed a parking permit, and I told her, if you're going to be on campus, I think you will need one, and I still laugh about this, but she looked at me and she said, I think I can get away with it. I said, listen, hun, you know where your dad works, you're not going to get away with anything. Of course my point is, she did need to get the parking permit and you will too, if you're going to be on campus. So she didn't get away with it? She didn't get it, no, but I helped her buy the permit, just like a good dad would. And by the way, some people don't realize this, but even those of us who work within transit and parking, we have to have our own parking permit as well. And I think that's perfectly appropriate. University employees all have to have a parking permit no matter, you know, what part of the university that they work for. And I think that's good because across the board, everybody is having to abide by the guidelines that the university has in place. Gotcha. We actually have two questions from people. Tim asks, will my daughter always have a spot in the Garland garage, or do they oversell that location? They don't oversell what they do. They will sell so that everything is full. Now nobody's guaranteed the same space in a garage every time, but I would think it would be rare that you just couldn't find the space if you have the permit. Now the only exception might be is if several people parked in there illegally. We have had that happen. And when that happens, a lot of people are good to contact us and say, you know, does it look like they have the right permit to be in here? And so some of our enforcement comes from other people telling us that somebody's either in my spot or in a place where it keeps me from parking. I don't think I've ever had trouble finding a spot in Garland. And then Taylor asks, I'm supposed to move in on Friday and I still haven't received my parking permit in the mail. What do I do? Well, the good news is our parking enforcement, they're not trying to write citations when you move in. So even if you didn't have the permit, you know, that's not a day when you're likely to get a citation unless you did something really foolish. And the only reason I say that is some people have done that in the past. On move-in days, we've had some people try to park on the sidewalk or park on the grass or just do something that, you know, most of us understand you shouldn't do that. And in those kind of cases, someone will deal with it. But, you know, on move-in day, you shouldn't worry. It's just also to be understood that according to the directions that you've received about move-in, you need to get in and get out and then move to one of the areas that's set aside for you. But if the green permit is not in your possession at that time, you don't need to sweat it just, you know, like I said, be responsible where you are with the vehicle. Gotcha. And we do recommend that after you unload your car and have that 45 minutes in the lot for move-in that you go over to lot 56 if you're a student, which is on the south end of campus. Did we point it out on the map? I would want that out now if you want. Yeah, let's point out that. You can see, the heart of campus is right here and when you look at it online, you can see that much more clearly. But lot 56 is in this area. It's very large. It's going to accommodate, you know, anybody that needs to be there on move-in day. So you'll want to be aware of that. It will get crowded on move-in day. It could be a little frustrating, but usually when everybody's patient, we get to do everything that we need to do. And like I said, the people who write citations are that's not their goal on that day. They're not trying to get a citation written to you. They're trying to make sure everybody gets to where they need to be. So that's a little bit different look. So I wanted you to be aware of that. Great. Tracy asks, will a student with resident reserved to be assured of a parking space? For example, at a dohee in lot 77? Yes. The short answer is yes, but it's like I answered just a moment ago when it comes to garages. We do have instances where somebody who may have a green permit they'll try to park in a resident reserve. Now they get a citation because they should get a citation. But in the meantime, if a few people pull in there illegally and then you come in with your permit, it's your spot may not be there, but it's not because we don't have one for you, it's because someone else is trying to take it, so we'll deal with that. I can say that I have parking on campus too and I'm in an area that's smaller and if it's not if I can't find a space there, we can always tell parking in transit and they'll come in and check and make sure that the people are there legally parked and if they're not, then they'll be cited. So it's kind of driven to some degree. And where is the best place to let someone know that they think... I would call the 575PARK and of course that's during regular office hours. In the evening it's a little harder to get in touch with us or send an email, but we still have enforcement around the clock. Obviously we don't have as many enforcement personnel out and about on campus in the middle of the night, but we do have enforcement even after hours. Gotcha. And we can maybe wait for people to submit any other questions, but did you have anything else to look over? Well, we always say that we're kind of the the department on campus that a lot of people get upset with and we understand that because if you think about it, let's say if you get a parking citation and maybe it's $50 but still $50 is $50. We understand that even if you know you deserved the citation you're still not going to like it. I mean nobody likes getting any kind of ticket. I mean who does. And so we understand that it's frustrating. So with that in mind we don't go around campus. Some people say we have a quota which we don't. There are some people that say that transit and parking, you know the people that write the citations make more money if they write more citations and that's not correct either. Our purpose as a department and our goal as a department is to try to get everybody on campus to where they need to be and that's why Racerback Transit is a part of our operation too. A lot of times generally speaking the people like the buses on campus but they're not crazy about the parking but it's just because there's so many thousands of people who need to come here at the same time. If anybody is wondering how many spaces we have a lot of people say we don't have enough parking but if you add up if you add up all of the spaces on campus all of the parking lots all of the garages all of the reserved if you add all of that up it's more than 14,000 spaces. And when we do audits of our parking areas we find that during the busiest times there are 10,000 or 11,000 vehicles on campus so when people say we don't have enough parking here what they really mean is there's not enough parking right by the front door of where they want to go. There's always enough parking it's just it's not always possible for it to be convenient for everybody. Okay and then we have a few more questions so Clay asks can we pay and receive permits in person during Friday moving? You could but we're not really everything right now because of coronavirus concerns it's set up so that your parking permit will come to you in the mail you can order that online and they will mail it to you the only time you would need to come in our office right now is like I mentioned earlier if you had ADA parking concerns or if you had needed to get a permit for a motorcycle the only other exception would be is if you talked to someone in our office and they said yeah we got your permit here you can come by and pick it up if someone specifically tells you that then you can come by and take care of it but other than that we have kind of a skeleton crew right now and that is also the cause of coronavirus concerns so we are not set up to take care of everybody that walks in the door will take care of those issues that have to be done in person. Okay and Diego says I have applied for parking and no response I would call back to 575 the ARK you could also send an email to remind us at parknet at ur.edu I would do that actually if I was talking to Diego one on one I would say let me get your contact information I will make sure somebody gets to you but we can't hardly do that right here but we at any rate please try again reach out to us again and then we will go from there Alright thank you and Becky asks I understand there is no backing in and to stay off the lines well at this point you need to stay off the lines no matter when you park we try not to be picky about that except if it prevents someone from parking in the next space that is a problem so you do need to be mindful of the lines the parking areas right now wherever you park you can back in a space to the next space except if you're in a garage where it's angled parking we don't allow backing in to angled parking because that creates kind of a problem but right now you can pull through yeah that makes sense and Anthony asks when will resident reserve open for parking during or after move in it should be good to go before the first day of class we usually make an announcement about that we designated that way the weekend before classes started and housing housing will take custody will take over some of the resident reserve parking during the move in time which starts really I think Wednesday and will go through Saturday and possibly Monday but then we're out of those lots and they are turned over to the students to use as they need to as soon as we're done they go right back to the students and that is a good question because throughout the summer in an ordinary summer we have a lot of people working here and taking summer coursework now this summer has been different obviously but in a typical summer we have a lot of different people who are legally allowed to park in the red resident reserve areas and we usually have a cutoff date where we tell everybody you can't park there anymore unless you have the new resident reserve permit for the coming school year so when we reach that date you know we make sure everyone knows you know that that's what that's for that's only for the students with the appropriate permit gotcha thank you Anthony also asks can students park in the new art annex lot and do they need a special permit I'm not sure what they mean by the arts annex lot but if they give me a lot there's a building in the south southwestern part that is I guess the art annex and so maybe that specific lot is what they're talking about I would say refer to the map when you go to our parking website there is a we have a parking options chart if you click on parking there's two or three links that come up and we have a chart that gives a breakdown whatever permit you have it'll tell you it will allow you to park besides your regular place and it's basically a park down system if you have a green permit it also allows you to park in the orange commuter lot that I referred to earlier so a lot of students will take advantage of that you just need to be careful and read what it says on our website I'm sorry I couldn't speak specifically to that lot I'm not sure what we're talking about just yet Diane I believe this is our final question from Diane she said my daughter was granted a parking pass in garland we leave tomorrow do we come pick it up I wouldn't unless somebody in the office told you it was here and available because it may very well be in the mail even as we speak and you could always call our office to double check gotcha thank you I believe that's it for our audience questions did we have any closing remarks well I would say come and talk to us or contact us to talk to us if you have any issues because we don't want the students or faculty or any employees we don't want anybody to guess about where they need to park if they're not sure and like I said no matter what you might hear our number one goal is not to hammer you with a citation we want you to just have a less complicated experience getting from point A to point B and that's why we're here I also like to tell students you know we're a part of this university we support the university's educational mission and we've had a slogan put up on signs before in different places and we sometimes say we're not just helping you get to class we're helping you get to graduation because that's what we want about just parking lots and citations and buses we're about we want students to be successful so when you get that degree in hand you're really you're better prepared to be successful and whatever else you might want to do so we're here to help with that yeah that's great well thank you so much for giving us all this great info about transit and parking you want to give us a wave as we close out great seeing all of you we at this point maybe sometime we can talk in person maybe someday we'll do it without mask we can hope but at any rate we want you to have a great school year we appreciate you choosing the university of Arkansas alright thank you David