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The Rice Thresher
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by Rachel Krause Thresher staff Stadium parking and shuttle routes both have been substantially altered for the upcoming school year. According to Campus Police Chief Bill Taylor, the department expects that it will take people a few weeks to adjust to the new parking setup. It is currently focusing on getting people to learn where they can park. Facilities and Engineering has put up temporary signs and will replace them with permanent ones within a month. Taylor added that the possibility of permanent signs color coded with the various parking permits has been discussed as a means to help distinguish the different lots. Colored lines, which correspond with their respective parking permits, may also be drawn around the lots. Faculty and staff parking in the stadium was expanded from one to three rows directly behind Alice Pratt Brown Hall to accommodate the reduction of faculty parking that caused by the closing of the Laboratory Road Lot. Resident student parking is located in the three rows just beyond the new faculty parking. The commuter student lot has been moved back and is now the section closest to the stadium. A triangular visitors' lot has been added behind residential parking. The faculty and staff stadium parking borders the left side of the visitors' lot and runs parallel to the police station. Open stadium parking has been designated in the area behind the police station. Many students said they were unaware that such changes had been made. "I just had no clue that this was happening," Will Rice College senior Nicci Lew said. "There wasn't very much publicity about the changes." The shuttle bus routes have been changed as of Aug. 21. The shuttles stop at Herring Hall, Baker College, the Allen Center, Duncan Hall, the Chemistry Lecture Hall and the Student Center. The shuttles now make a larger loop on the stadium lot instead of going down the road behind Alice Pratt Brown Hall. The greater loop bus now also offers an expanded service and exits campus from Entrance 12, travels around Rice Boulevard, Greenbriar Drive and University Boulevard, and re-enters campus through Entrance 8. It also makes seven stops within the stadium lot. "The idea for the changes is that wherever students park, they will have a shorter distance to walk to the bus stop," Facilities Planner Max Amery said. Sid Richardson College senior Fernando Acosta, a resident student, agreed with the idea. "I don't think it's such a big deal that commuter students have to park further out," he said. "I mean, they're already walking from the stadium lot to their classes. What's another three rows going to be, especially when the shuttle bus runs through the middle of the parking lot?" However, Sid junior Allison Dennis, also a resident student, said she believes the changes further alienate off-campus students. "Having lived off-campus last year, I think it's really too bad that the off-campus people got moved further back," Dennis said. "With less parking in the residential lots, it pushes them away from the college system because it makes the college system less accessible." Candice Hance, a Baker College sophomore who commutes, said she is pleased that the commuter parking is closer to the shuttle stops but said she worries about commuters forced to walk out to their cars late at night when the buses aren't running. "I like the fact that the buses are closer, but if we are on campus at night when the buses aren't running, it's really bad because it's that much further we have to walk in the dark," Hance said. "For the most part it makes sense, though," she said. Three bus shelters will be located in the stadium lot. Two of these were relocated from across from Alice Pratt Brown Hall and are already in place. The third shelter will be put between the commuter and residential lots and is expected to be up in the next few weeks. The shuttles will no longer stop in front of Alice Pratt Brown Hall. Handicapped spots have been designated around each shelter and blue light phones will be added near each in the next two or three months. As an additional safety measure, overhead lights have been added and redistributed to bring more light to the south stadium area.
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