Rutgers-Newark Offers Valet Parking
Wednesday, August 27, 2003
NEWARK - Rutgers University's crowded Newark campus has added some pomp to
its circumstance with valet parking.
The university said it wants to make parking easier for students, many of whom are commuters who have complained they sometimes miss class while searching for a spot.
But the notion of a service more closely associated with country clubs and casinos than with colleges raised some eyebrows on campus.
"It does sound pretentious," said Thomas Lee, 23, of Englishtown, a first-year student at Rutgers Law School. "Especially for a state school. A private school, maybe, like some wealthy school in Connecticut."
Effective Monday, two lots will have valet parking Monday through Thursday for students, faculty, and staff with parking permits. Permit fees will rise about 10 percent to $154 per semester in 2003-04, and $106 for summer 2004, said Rutgers spokeswoman Helen Paxton.
Paxton said parking has become tighter as Newark's student enrollment expanded in recent years. Enrollment jumped about 10 percent to 6,706 undergraduates and 3,640 graduate students last September from the same period in 2001, she said.
"We do have a lot of students who have working lives as well, and they don't have a huge amount of time," Paxton said. "It's not a country club thing, it's a management of time and space."
