Delay at new MUN lot could make parking harder in first week back
Students heading back to school next week may have a harder time finding a parking spot at Memorial University's St. John's campus.
Crews are still working on completing two new parking lots in the Elizabeth Avenue area, to replace spaces lost to a new core sciences building.
Memorial announced a the new building would be constructed on the site of a parking lot that had 370 spaces, and the creation of three new lots would only replace 260 spots.
Spokesperson David Sorensen says one of those lots was scheduled to be ready by Sept. 7, but is a week behind schedule due to delays in construction.
"That was scheduled to be completed Sept. 7 when the contractor got into developing the base for the catch basin they found a lot of bedrock in there which delayed them slightly and it's expected to be open on Sept. 14," he said.
Sorensen said in the meantime it may be a bit harder for people to find a parking spot, but he doesn't expect it will be too bad.
"There's a little bit of a challenge there, no doubt, come September when classes start there will be a couple of challenges, but I don't think it's anything that will be too difficult for folks."
Making up for overall parking loss
As for making up for the 110 spots lost overall, Sorensen said Memorial is working on coming up with solutions.
"There are a few possibilities around campus to find a solution to that, nothing I can report right now, but we're still working toward finding a solution to those extra parking spaces," he said.
"I mean it's a challenge, no doubt, but we are paying a great deal of attention to it and trying to solve that problem."
Sorensen said the ideal scenario would be fewer people driving to the campus in general, opting instead for carpooling or public transit, but that's not a feasible expectation.
"No one wants to see green space taken up for parking lots, but the fact is people in Newfoundland and Labrador drive and people in St. John's drive. They're coming from long distances," he said.
"We're never going to have parking space for everyone who needs one, hopefully with pay and display, hopefully with potential improvements to transit we can solve that problem."
The St. John's campus has about 4,000 parking spaces total, Sorensen said, but the average daytime population in September — including staff and students — sits around 19,000.
