Parking Plans?: West explores potential new parking options
West’s third student parking lot which features the vehicles of mostly juniors and some senior vehicles. With a growing student population, parking spaces are becoming harder to get.
December 18, 2018
In a school of more than 2,000 students, many of whom are able to drive, it hasn’t been feasible to provide parking for every upperclassman at West. Even with four student parking lots that each hold between 130 to 150 spaces, the demand for spots is much higher than the lots’ availability, hence the huge lines for parking passes in front of the school each summer.
“The process of getting a parking pass is very stressful because you never know if you’ll be able to get a spot because the spaces are so limited,” junior Cara Chilson said.
The students unable to get a parking pass have searched for parking elsewhere. In years past these students have parked their vehicles at River Oaks Community Church which is only a short walk from the school. This school year River Oaks is unavailable to students’ vehicles due to construction on the parking lot. Nevertheless, alternate parking has been found. Students have been parking in the Friends Baptist Church across the street from River Oaks. While more students are able to drive to school, it has made for a dangerous situation of students crossing four lanes of traffic on Lewisville-Clemmons Road.
“We have told students not to park at the Friends Baptist Church, but since they still choose to park there it creates an obvious safety issue for us,” said Principal Charles McAninch.
West’s third student parking lot.
Aware of this problem, the school’s administration is currently seeking out new possibilities for student parking. The school is unable to enter any kind of agreement with River Oaks over the matter; however, the school district has been contacted about possibly leasing River Oaks’ plentiful parking spaces.
“That would prompt the hiring of an additional security officer to monitor and control that,” Principal Charles McAninch said.
The school is also in possession of undisclosed areas of land nearby. This could mean future plans for additional lots that would ease West’s high demand for on-campus parking, though this cannot be confirmed.
The growing population of West has proved to be a challenge when it comes to student parking accommodations, but with possible plans in motion for the future, many more students could be provided with spaces to park their vehicles.
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