A-West out of parking passes, what happens now?

Gear+shift+in+car+set+to+park.+

Caius Krohnfeldt

Gear shift in car set to park.

There are 1396 students enrolled at A-West that are not freshmen. Even if only half of them had a driver’s license that would still mean 698 students who would need parking at A-west. Student parking is designated to the northern parking lot (the south is reserved for staff). There are 508 parking spots in the aforementioned north lot and you need an A-West issued parking pass to park in any of them. 

Recently there have been a lot of questions regarding parking passes as more and more students reach the required age to drive. Recently in class meetings with all grade levels administration at A-West has released the information that there are no more available parking passes to issue. Meaning that anyone who does not currently have a parking pass can no longer get one. 

This begs the question, what happens to people who park in the southern lot without a parking permit? A-West resource officer Brad Gagon has the answer. 

According to Gagon, “The parking lot is considered private property, so there [are] only a handful of tickets that I can write, or deal with. The parking passes are dealt with by the campus supervisors.” 

To put this in other words, the parking tickets issued by the school are different from normal parking tickets issued by the police force. These tickets only lead to a $20 dollar fine for parking in the lot without a permit. 

Now how can these permits be associated with a student if their car is not registered with the school? Gagon has the answer for this as well saying, “A lot of times we’ll know the kid from other tickets they have received. If it’s a repeat offender, I might look into it to see if it’s a student and not some random person parking in our lot. So for safety issues I can run the plate and find out who the owner of the car is.” 

So with the knowledge that you will be ticketed and fined for parking in the north lot without a student parking pass your best option is to find parking elsewhere. However the other main parking lot on the south side of the building is not a viable option. 

The south lot is reserved for teacher and visitor parking only. Teachers are issued different parking passes than the students so even if you have a pass you can be ticketed for parking in the southern lot. Visitors have reserved parking in the south lot but any issues regarding the accidental issuing of a ticket to a visitor can be taken up with the financial office at Arvada west. 

Remaining parking for those without a pass can be found on the streets surrounding the school (not 64th Ave)  or nearby as long as no signage prevents it.