Image courtesy of Hayden Graham | The Crow’s Nest
By Hayden Graham
The price for a single-semester, non-resident parking permit at the University of South Florida is $91. A steep cost to some students, especially commuters who have been struggling to make it to classes on time due to lack of parking at all three campuses.
The Tampa campus at USF has 14,888 parking spaces, but in the 2023 fiscal year 80,125 permits were issued.
The reasoning is that not every student will be on campus for the entire day. But during the rush hours of 11:00 a.m. to 3:15 p.m. many students are struggling to find any spaces at all.
Jessica Heintz, a senior majoring in biomedical sciences and Spanish said she was late to class because of the lack of parking during the first week of classes and has resorted to walking to campus.
“During the first week of school I arrived on campus at around 10 a.m. for an 11 a.m. class and didn’t manage to find a spot at all,” Heintz said. “It was terrible having to walk from my apartment and show up 30 minutes late to class during add/drop week.”
When asked if any plan was in place to adjust for these rush hours Randy Pogue, a manager at USF Parking Services, said this: “Parking Services monitors parking daily in all lots and the garage. We have not reached full capacity on campus, so spaces are always available, but perhaps not where one would prefer.”
While some have opted to walk, others have chosen to use campus resources. If traveling on or near the Tampa campus, the Bull Runner has become one solution.
The Bull Runner is a campus bus system that is included in tuition for students use. During 2023 so far, more than 560,000 passengers have taken a ride on the Bull Runner.
Despite the usage being so high the Bull Runner still has its issues.
Julio Martinez is a former mass communication major at USF who graduated in the spring of 2022. In his first year at the University in 2019, he didn’t have a vehicle to drive to school in but lived near the Tampa campus.
His usage of the transit system was not positive. “In my experience the Bull Runner was always packed,” Martinez said. “And the arrival times in the app were rarely accurate.”
One more option for travel to or around the Tampa campus is still in development. A carpool program began testing in the fall of 2022, but still hasn’t officially been announced as a permanent solution.
The concept is an app used to organize carpools to and from campus with other users traveling to the same location. The users involved would spend $156 per year for the carpool permit.
The benefit for these students was a designated spot in Park and Ride lots around the campus. To join the program, a survey must be filled out on the university’s website.
So far, the solutions from the university have only been beneficial for the Tampa campus. For those who attend the St. Petersburg campus, but need to take a class in Tampa, the only option is to drive.
In an interview with The Crow’s Nest last October, current USF St. Petersburg Lieutenant Governor Taylor Herman said, “Now that the university is committed to OneUSF, intercampus busing could be an important step in unifying all three campuses.”
No form of public transportation has been introduced on campus, but creating an intercampus bus line would alleviate parking struggles in Tampa allowing more spots for Tampa residents.
In terms of a consistent intercampus system Pogue says, “an ongoing intercampus service would need to be evaluated based on a demand analysis for both the frequency and capacity required and the cost.”
