With the winter semester well underway, the parking frustrations at the Interurban campus have reached a breaking point with students and staff alike. The lack of parking spots during the busiest time of the semester has sparked complaints and frustration over Camosun’s absence of solutions despite years of concern over the issue.
The parking problem is not new, according to Electronics and Computer Engineering instructor Justin Curran, who has seen this situation worsen over time.
“Actually, [it’s been going on for] years now,” says Curran. “I mean, the parking on the lawns is the worst I’ve seen, which has just started happening this term.”
Nursing alumna Amy Davenport shares the sentiment about this problem not being new and adds that this issue caused her stress after practicum.
“I would often come to school hours early before my classes to ensure getting a spot near the building, or even a spot at all on campus so that I could be on time for my classes,” says Davenport, who graduated in 2023. “When I worked in the mornings and couldn’t go early like I usually wanted to, to ensure a spot, it caused me a lot of stress and anxiety before my classes because I was almost late every single time those days.”
The sight of student vehicles parked on grass is an example of students’ desperation; searching for a spot disrupts their daily routines, according to Curran.
“We’re just losing time,” he says. “If we have any errands and meetings that are off campus, if we come back or if we just have later start times in the day [there will be no parking left]. Today, for instance, I showed up to campus half an hour before my class, just after 10:00, and there’s no parking to be had.”
Curran has had to use the Vancouver Island Technology Park parking lot, a significant walk from campus, to get to class on time.
“It’s like a 10-minute walk. So from there back to campus, you get to drive around, go over there and pay,” says Curran. “The faculty can submit a receipt to get reimbursed for doing it, but students aren’t even made aware that there’s parking over there available to them.”
Curran says the school tried to fix this problem with a solution that only made matters worse for students.
“The teachers union complained last year,” he says. “They assured [us] that there’d be more parking for staff by replacing a bunch of stalls for staff parking, which is partially why the student parking is worse now.”
This has resulted in students having to park in the lawns or staff parking spots, which can mean fines or, in some cases, getting their vehicle towed. Curran says he has no idea why the college is not doing anything about it but offers some ideas to help.
“I have no idea; no one has said why. I mean, there’s a bunch of options for them that they can look into,” he says. “Like adding more parking by adding, say, gravel parking… extending the gravel lot for PISE. There’s a whole parking lot behind the Vancouver Island Tech Park that’s empty and chained off, so they could rent off them.”
Camosun College Student Society (CCSS) external executive Prince Solanki, who studies at Interurban, confirms that parking can be increasingly difficult in the morning.
“If your class is at 10:30 and you are at the campus around 10:00, I’m telling you, you’ll be late in the class because you won’t get any parking at that time,” says Solanki. “It’s getting worse. I’ve also seen students parking their cars on the grass because they have to get to classes. So students are parking their cars off the parking [lots]. And last I heard from students they even got fined for that as well.”
However, Solanki says the CCSS board has made parking one of its top priorities. On Monday, January 13, the board met with Camosun College Faculty Association (CCFA) president Lynelle Yutani to discuss this problem.
“We had a meeting with the CCFA because of [an] incident when they towed lots of cars from the campus,” says Solanki. “We had a pretty huge conversation about the parking issues on campus… and we have decided we’re going to talk to the college about this.”
Camosun College declined a request to be interviewed for this story.