The long line of cars down the hill at Rio Hondo College didn’t stop students from driving up the hill in search for more open spots. I was one of those students as well.  I had my first class at 8 a.m. and I left my house 30 minutes early. I circled the lot for 20 minutes before becoming lucky enough to find a parking spot. This time I was able to find parking in under 30 minutes, unfortunately I know some of my fellow classmates that weren’t so lucky.

This is not something new to Rio Hondo. They have hired more traffic guards to help with delays and keep this dilemma from getting out of control as impatient students hurry to look for parking and make it to class on time.

Many students have mixed emotions about the parking situation at hand. Some say that it’s the student’s responsibility to come extra early in hopes of finding a parking spot and making it to class on time, while some feel the school itself is just over populated and changes need to be made to create more parking spots to help match the capacity of students that Rio Hondo College has taken on.

In reality it is the student’s responsibility to get to class on time. School officials had sent a letter to all the students warning them about potential traffic delays. This suggestion would be feasible if more spots opened up faster but in some cases students are left circling the parking lot for over half an hour, going from lot to lot using more gas driving around in search of parking than actually driving to school.

Other students feel that it is the school’s obligation to accommodate the rising number of students to help with the parking problem. Many have requested a new parking structure to be built in hopes that it would help solve the problem but the location of where the parking structure could be placed is a dilemma in itself.

Another option students have as an alternative to driving up the hill is parking at the bottom of the hill and taking the tram up.  This would help avoid the whole looking for a parking spot situation but it also has it’s drawbacks. A student could take the tram up the hill and get dropped off right by campus but that still doesn’t change the fact that there is an overflow of traffic in the school. If you take the tram up you delete the obstacle of parking but you still have to wait to make it up the hill, and there is still a lot of congestion. Some students have even  reported that even when they take the tram up the hill, they are still late due to all the congestion. This results in some teachers deducting points or dropping students from classes for being tardy.

It seems the only option is to make a new parking structure to fix the
“parking woes at Rio Hondo.”