UT Parking and Transportation announced the addition of 200 more Commuter Core spaces to White Avenue parking garage.
These changes follow a university-wide parking revision that came into effect in August. Parking and Transportation implemented a tiered parking system as an attempt to relieve congestion seen across campus over the last several years.
The campus population has grown significantly — marking a record-breaking enrollment rate and retention rate just this year. Standing at 38,728 enrolled students, UT set an institutional record and plans to alleviate space issues through new parking and construction developments.
The tiered parking system has three levels — Core, Intermediate and Remote. Each level comes with its own perks and accommodations. This system prioritizes upperclassmen on a first come, first served basis to buy parking permits. This leaves underclassmen — primarily freshmen — left with no choice but to buy a Remote. With this in mind, UT encourages first-year students living on campus to leave their cars at home and use the public transportation options like the T-Link and KAT buses.
UT Parking and Transportation will continue to make improvements as the year progresses and the university continues to grow.
The addition of Commuter Core spaces is an intentional choice made by the the Office of Parking and Transportation, as the lot has been underused as staff parking.
“We’ve tried to be very intentional and transparent with the changes we’ve instituted this semester, and after seeing that this area was underutilized as staff parking, we acted quickly to reallocate it in order to help ease demand for student parking,” said Executive Director of Parking and Transportation Tanara Teal-Tate in a press release. “Our goal throughout this transformation has been to provide more efficiency and predictability when parking on campus, and this is just another step toward fine-tuning our new zonal system.”
Students who were waitlisted when parking permits were released during the first round of sales have priority over the additional spots and invitations to purchase a pass will be sent out based on the order in which waitlists requests are received.
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