Dal’s ongoing issues with parking spaces reach a boiling point
After 30 years of teaching, Dalhousie professor Dan Middlemiss quit his job this month over the school’s lack of parking spaces, saying the problem isn’t specific to Dal.
Last year the Dunn parking lot was oversold by 915 parking passes, according to Samantha Chown’s article from the Gazette archives.
This year, spaces will only be oversold by 20 to 30 per cent. New short-term parking meters will also be added.
Middlemiss, a professor of political science, resigned on August 29 after waiting an hour and a half in line for a parking pass. He was turned away and told to come back the next day. “It was a Monday spur of the moment decision after 30 years of frustration,” he says.
“I didn’t start out to make this a crusade against Dal or against anyone else,” he says. “This is a problem that is endemic to the whole region. And it’s getting worse. There are just more and more people coming in.”
The new parking system makes the Dunn parking lot, between Fountain House and the Dunn building, a reserved lot with more expensive passes in hopes of decreasing demand on spaces. A draw eventually decided the recipients of these passes.
“I felt a bit sheepish afterwards,” he says. Through the media attention, his story has led to outpourings of support from as far away as South Africa. But there have been a few naysayers.
“There are some that are not so positive,” he says. “They say, ‘poor privileged professor’–and completely rightly so.”
Middlemiss acknowledges that he had an option that few other commuters do. He says some, like his secretary, waited in line for four hours without receiving a pass.
“It was an outburst of frustration, but I at least have an option. I feel sorry for my secretary and other staff and students, who are all trying to get these spots.”
Dalhousie’s Master Plan, which outlines the rejuvenation of all three campuses over the next ten years, includes plans for decreasing the volume of traffic by encouraging bike and transit options.
“If only it were that simple,” says Middlemiss. Living in Lower Sackville, a one-way bus trip takes approximately two hours and biking down two highways is not an option.
“To be fair to Dal, it’s not their problem and they’ve been very forthright about all this,” he says. Middlemiss sees the real problem as Halifax’s transit system, which he says would benefit from a more direct route to universities, and an influx of cars from drivers living close to work or school.
“If I lived around the university I’d take transit. It’s getting to the core that’s the problem,” he says.
Dalhousie’s Master plan is against the creation of large parking facilities, in the interests of sustainability and decreasing commuting. It argues that “urban campuses” often see a decrease in numbers of commuters, as other options become available and the cost of driving increases.
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