Being a junior, I felt this year would be a good time to move off-campus and start to get the hang of living on my own. This year, I live in an apartment a few blocks from campus.
Although I wanted to bring my car and be able to drive places when I need , I felt the cost was too high to have a parking spot at my apartment to only use it every now and then.
Since my freshmen year, I heard from students how impossible the parking situation in the village tends to be. When on-campus residents would have guests spend the night, a parking pass would need to be obtained from parking services for $5.
I always thought students should have their guest's park on the street and save the trouble of dealing with parking services. Little to my knowledge was that parking on the streets of South Orange after 2 a.m. was not allowed and could lead to a fine.
After some of my friends started to move off-campus, I heard you could call your car in to the police station for overnight parking. This was not supposed to be a common occurrence.
This semester, friends of mine have been trying to park on the street when they bring their cars from home or even just to visit myself or other off-campus residents for the evening. As students began to call their cars in, the officers on the other end would reply "No we're not doing that tonight," and hang up.
The police department is now saying the overnight policy was just for emergencies. I understand the village of South Orange gains a lot of revenue from ticketing cars parked on the streets overnight: these tickets usually cost about $55. My issue is if a car is not commonly parked in South Orange, say a guest, where are they supposed to go?
It is not right someone in the village is ticketed $55 dollars for one night of parking. There should be some sort of allowance for overnight parking.
Nicole Bitette is a junior journalism major from, Woodbridge, NJ. She can be reached at nicole.bitette@student.shu.edu
