UCLA implements new student parking application
By Estefani Herrera
July 29, 2013 12:00 a.m.
UCLA Transportation and Parking introduced an online-only application process for parking permits this summer that prioritizes students based on class standing.
Permits will now be offered on a priority basis, beginning with students who have special needs, graduate students, regent scholars, undergraduate carpools and then solo undergraduate drivers. Parking officials will abandon the old process of ranking students by assigning them points based on a variety of criteria listed in their applications, such as if they have a child or where they work on campus.
The department is now using existing information from the university databases to process the parking requests, as a way to shorten the application, said Lisa Koerbling, parking and finance director for UCLA Transportation.
Previously, students would submit paper or online applications to be reviewed by the parking department. Officials would then give points to the applicants given certain criteria, such as commute distance, child care and employment. Applicants with higher point values, regardless of class standing, would be given priority of a parking permit.
Specific needs, such as employment and childcare, will still be considered when assigning parking spots, but class standing will be the main criteria, Koerbling said.
Students with special circumstances, such as a disability, or commute from home can indicate their situation on the new application to receive a permit on time or in the specific spot they need.
The deadline to submit applications for parking was Friday. Students who missed the deadline can still apply online for the spots that are still available, Koerbling said.
UCLA received about 3,000 permit applications for fall quarter on Friday, a significant decrease from the roughly 6,000 applicants for fall 2008, 2009 and 2010, Koerbling said.
She added that everyone who applied will most likely get a spot.
Student demand for parking has been steadily decreasing over the last few years, with about 5,000 applicants in fall 2011 and 4,000 in fall 2012, although it is not yet clear why there was a such a significant drop this year, she said.
Joshua Kim, a third-year linguistics student, said he recently applied to get a parking permit and is waiting to hear if his application was accepted.
“As a transfer, the new system works well for me because I am an upperclassman,” he said. “But it might not be fair for other students.”
Another feature of the new application process is that it no longer requires students to verify information they provided on their application because they are pulling from UCLA’s online database, Koerbling said.
Dylan Black, a second-year biophysics student and a Regent’s Scholar, said the process for him and other scholars is relatively simple, because they could ignore most aspects of the application and indicate their scholar status.
“Now the process is much easier for everyone else, and I would imagine more people would try for (permits),” he said.
