MRU Parking analysis underway
by Bryan Weismiller
The Reflector
Mount Royal University administration has started looking into the campus’ parking situation starting with a survey, which was emailed to a group of students earlier this month.
It is the first significant study since The Campus Transportation Strategy was released in 2005. Major physical changes have been made in the last six years, such as lot restructuring and the recent opening of the parkade. The west leg of the LRT is also expected to affect transportation to and from the campus.
“We’ve seen a huge shift in transportation behaviours,” said Amy Thai, sustainable transportation co-ordinator at Mount Royal University. “We’re interested in seeing, which modes of transportation people are using and figuring out the barriers to using alternative transportation methods.”
Thai said the survey will help the parking and transportation office track progress, improve services and plan future projects. Single occupancy vehicles are currently the dominant mode of transportation on campus.
“We want to see what kind of options students are aware of and reasons why they may not use some of those options,” Thai said. “We just want to show students there are a lot of different transportation options for getting to campus.
“We also want to learn about areas they’re not too satisfied with, so we also want to see how we can improve those areas and provide a better level of service.”
Students have until March 30 to complete the survey, and Thai said they’ve already seen a “Pretty high response rate,” so far. Thai said she hopes students will give feedback through the survey or by talking directly to the parking office. The parking survey is part of a bigger project, which combines information from Calgary Transit and the City of Calgary. The results will be tallied and released in the next few months.
It would be interesting to know which group of students were emailed the survey.
Was it just students who were able to buy a parking pass, or will the survey also include students who have to park in the neighborhood surrounding MRU because they either missed their chance or can’t afford to park on-campus? What about students who take transit/bike/walk, who also would have comments about parking and transportation (either because parking here doesn’t work for them because of cost or lack of spots, or any other reason).
Likewise, what about anonymous surveys for faculty and staff who can and can’t afford to park on campus, even though they do get an early chance at purchasing? Continuing education students who once had an easy time finding parking for a 6pm class but now struggle to find a spot and still make it to class on time?
I’m also curious how much research has been done with the neighbouring homes and businesses – on how MRU’s parking situation is affecting our neighbours, and neighbourhood attitudes for MRU and MRU students/staff.
A little more information about the methodology would be great to add to this article. (Especially if after March 30th there will be no further surveys.)
Thanks for your input!
A sidebar-sized article may not have been comprehensive enough. I will send an email to Stefan Durston, manager of parking and transportation services, and hopefully he’ll be willing to provide more details on the survey.
Here’s a slightly condensed version of what Stefan sent me this morning. I hope it helps clarify a couple of your concerns…
The survey was done by OIAP (The Office of Institutional Analysis and Planning). My understanding is that the survey went to a random group of students and all the employees. The Parking department doesn’t know who was surveyed and who was not, and has no control over who is and is not contacted.
One other thing worth correcting is that employees do not get to purchase permits before students. Annual permit holders receive priority and many students have a current annual permit and will be given priority purchasing privileges.