TPAC - Your Parking Committee
By: Bob Browand
TPAC - Your Parking Committee
One of the most common complaints I hear semester after semester is that we in parking made a decision or change to our operations without first consulting the campus community; however, if there’s one thing you take away from this blog, please let it be that that accusation is just not true.
What is TPAC?
What a lot of people don’t realize is that we actually have the Transportation and Parking Advisory Committee, also known as TPAC, in place to prevent that very thing from ever happening. Comprised of student government, staff council and faculty senate representatives, this group meets once a month during the academic year to discuss and vote on everything from how events like Frontier Fiesta will impact campus parking and traffic to whether or not parking permit rates should be increased.
While members discuss the pros and cons of various issues and how they might impact the campus—especially their specific constituent groups—my team and I take notes and provide insight on what we can do on our end to resolve a problem or improve operations. Even though TPAC members do not have the final say in our decisions, their feedback is invaluable to us as it gives us a glimpse into how the campus community could react to our actions.
The meetings are also the opportunity for my group and me to provide updates on services, projects and the parking and transportation program as a whole.
How can you get involved?
Now I know some of you may be wondering how your voice can be heard in this whole process. One option is to go to your specific representatives and express your concerns and issues with them so that they may bring them up at the next meeting. However, another route you can take is to contact me directly before any meeting and ask to be added to the open forum section of our agenda.
Each month, before we dive into updates and addressing action items from the last meeting, we allow individuals from campus who have a specific concern, request or need, to address the committee and state their case. Once they’ve stated their case, members will discuss and determine what action, if any, should be taken to address the specific concern. Past open forums have covered topics such as maintenance requests for specific lots, the need for visitor parking outside certain buildings and even enforcement concerns, so there’s almost no limit for what can be discussed.
Attend a meeting
If you’re interested in learning more firsthand, I invite you to attend a meeting. Our next one, which will be the second to last one for the semester, will be taking place at 1:30 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 20 in the Student Center South Heights Room.
published: Tuesday, Nov. 17, 2015