OFF THE
BEATEN PATH The funny, offbeat, and just plain weird stories university parking professionals have lived to tell.
P
ARKING PROFESSIONALS who’ve been in the industry
any amount of time can generally tell stories that make others’ eyes widen and result in a “no way” from listen-
ers. Few days are the same, and there are lots of days that can make parking pros go “hmm.” Some of IPI’s university members shared their favorite stories of working in campus parking, and they’re doozies!
The Lockout. Almost. A student contacted the University of California Irvine Transportation Department because she locked her keys in the car. When the campus enforcement officer arrived at the scene, following protocol, he asked the student for proof of identity. The student replied, “Of course, it’s in my glove compartment,” and immediately reached for the passenger side door handle. Needless to say, she was quite embarrassed when the door actually opened.
—Ronald M. Fleming Director, Transportation and Distribution Services University of California, Irvine
THE PARKING PROFESSIONAL | MARCH 2018 | PARKING.ORG/TPP
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PHOTO SUBMITTED BY SHAUNA ATKINS, ASSISTANT DIRECTOR, INFRASTRUCTURE & CAPITAL PROJECTS
The Wannabe
Looking Skyward The University of Colorado Boulder Parking Services Facilities Operations staff recently located a traffic cone strategically lodged in a tree on campus. We feel this photo brings new definition to the term “cone zone!” —Rita Martin
Many years ago when I was a parking officer at California State University Fullerton, I volunteered to go to California State University Los Angeles to assist with traffic control for their commencement ceremonies. I was assigned with one of their parking sergeants to direct exiting traffic from one of the parking structures. The structure had three exits onto the same road, so we had to alternate stopping traffic at two exits while letting the third one flow out. Traffic was moving, slow but smooth, when a vehicle stopped in the middle of the roadway. The driver exited the vehicle and began directing traffic. The sergeant went up to her (I was stunned speechless) and asked, “Ma’am what are you doing?” “The traffic is moving too slow,” she shot back. “You obviously don’t know what you are doing so I’m taking over!” The sergeant tried every explanation she could think of to get this lady to get back into her car and move on, but nothing worked. In the end, we had to call a police officer to get her to leave. In 16 years of parking and working 20 commencements on four separate campuses, I have never seen anything else like it. —John Orr, CAPP
Communications Manager, Parking & Transportation Services University of Colorado, Boulder
Sweet, Sweet Meter In March 2011 an unknown student group decided to decorate one of our single-space parking meters with gumballs. This particular meter was near four residence halls in the center of our campus across the street from the campus police department. Each gumball was attached with a chewed piece of gum. Because the working of the meter were not affected, no DNA testing was done and the culprits were never caught. A rain storm was able to remove most of the gumballs. Our amused and amazed staff had to finish the job with a putty knife and clean up the sweet-but-sticky mess. —Jenni Sparks
Manager, Parking Services University of Delaware
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THE PARKING PROFESSIONAL | MARCH 2018 | PARKING.ORG/TPP
Parking Operations Manager California State University, Los Angeles
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Curses, Elevator!
ISTOCK / DANSIN
I was the event manager on duty for a large concert that we expected to sell out. I received a radio call that the garage was almost full, and the parking attendants started sending cars to the top level. I was in the office finishing up a money change-out and quickly jumped in the elevator to assess the roof for an exact count. On my way to the roof, the elevator stopped. The doors would not open, and it would not move up or down. Mistakenly, I’d left both my phone and my radio sitting on the desk and had no way to notify any of my staff that I was stuck. I hit the help button and advised the security office that they needed to get word to the parking staff that I may be awhile getting there. They were not very helpful. The elevator I was stuck in had three walls of glass, and I could see the cars lined up on the street. I knew we were going to be full but had no way to stop them. After a few minutes, the elevator doors just opened. I was on the third floor and could see cars sitting on the ramp to the top level, where I knew there were no more spaces. I grabbed the nearest parking attendant’s radio and started the orders: “Get everyone back down to the bottom level to make space or give a refund.” We parked cars along the walls and in motorcycle spaces to make as many spaces as we could and then I stood at the exit and apologized for the issue as we issued refunds to those who did not get a space. There were a lot of angry customers, but it was the best I could do after being stuck in the elevator. —Christmas Mensah
Operations Manager, Parking & Transportation Services Cleveland State University
Not Exactly I was overseeing traffic control for the Special Games (an event for several hundred physically and mentally disabled children) at California State University Fullerton. There is a roadway that separates the field where the games were being held and the gym where the bathroom facilities were located. For safety, we closed off the roadway; I had a student officer posted at each end to prevent vehicles from going through the barricades. I received a call from one of my officers that he’d had a confrontation with a university staff member. He told me that a staff member drove up and demanded to be let through so she could park in the lot next to the health center. He explained why the road was closed and pointed out another lot she could park in about 50 yards farther from the health center than the lot she wished to park in. She continued to demand he let her through. His response was, “Ma’am I can’t let you through. I have to follow orders.” She replied, “You know who else was just following orders? The Nazis.” He replied, “Ma’am, being Jewish I don’t appreciate being called a Nazi.” At this point she left without further complaint. When he finished his story I asked him, “You’re Jewish?” He looked at me and said, “Nope.” —John Orr, CAPP
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Mocumentaried In early spring 2016 the University at Albany discontinued a bus stop due to lack of ridership. That semester, we fielded lots of inquires about the removal of the stop and continued to elaborate on the reason why it was eliminated. Late that semester, a student entered our facility on crutches with a video crew. He claimed he was injured running after one of our campus buses because the stop we discontinued was gone and he was trying to make it to the next stop. He wanted to know what we were going to do to fix this problem and if we going to reinstate this bus stop location. Somewhat taken aback, I began to notice some strange things about this student. His injured foot was wrapped in aluminum foil, his arm was in a sling but was moving all over the place, and the video crew was smirking. After fumbling through some explanations I went to shake his hand (on the injured arm) and he fell over our desk. At this point, one could tell something was amiss. A university police officer entered our office to conduct a transaction and saw the ending of what occurred. After a brief conversation, the officer went outside and confronted the group, who admitted they
were filming a “mockumentary.” The students were judicially refereed and a hearing was set. But the story doesn’t end there. Before and at that hearing, I used advice from a session conducted by IPI’s Cindy Campbell on media relations. Instead of coming down hard on a college prank, we used the situation as an opportunity to have the students interview our staff in a professional setting and ultimately had a productive dialogue with nothing placed on their records. It was a valuable lesson for the students, and the IPI training yielded great results. —Jason M. Jones Director, Parking and Mass Transit Services University at Albany
Thinking it Through Several years back, a very busy faculty lot was scheduled to be closed and replaced by a new academic building. The start of the project was delayed for a few months, but things finally got started. Thus, a few weeks ahead of the start date, parking services personnel placed signs at the entrance and exit to the lot and emailed faculty about the lot closing. The signs indicated which day the lot would close. The day to close the lot arrived and our people placed barricades across the entrance next to the “Lot Closed” signs. Around 11 a.m. the next day, we noticed a car with a faculty permit parked in the middle of the lot. This lot had several hundred spaces and normally filled by that time of day, but here was one, lone car amid the barricades. We contacted the faculty member who owned the car and asked why he parked there. He said he thought the lot was closed only the day before—the date on the sign—and didn’t realize the lot was closed from that day until eternity. The barricades had been pushed aside by the contractor working on putting up a construction fence. It turned out our faculty member was from the department who would occupy the new building and thus very much aware a building was being constructed there. We asked if he thought it was strange the lot was totally empty except for him on a Tuesday and he said, “Now I think of it, that is strange.” Strange probably wasn’t the exact word we used to describe it. —Josh Cantor Director, Parking and Transportation George Mason University
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THE PARKING PROFESSIONAL | MARCH 2018 | PARKING.ORG/TPP
Clairvoyant Much? We have a great working relationship with a couple of the churches across the street from our university, and they allow us to use their parking lots on weekdays. The caveat is that any weddings, meetings, or funerals supersede university parking for that time period. One day about three years ago, we had to close one of the lots for a funeral. This angered a student so much that she contacted our office and asked why the lot was closed. We told her about the funeral and when the lot would open. It was at that point that the student demanded a schedule for the funerals that would occur over the next year. —Vanessa Rath Parking Services Manager University of Nebraska Omaha
Whose Bad Luck? This story is funny unless you believe in superstitions. A number of years back, a professor in the process of leaving the university to return to his home in Hawaii contested a parking ticket he had received and demanded an immediate dismissal of the outrageous fine. After the review was completed a decision notice was mailed to him at his new home in Hawaii. Unfortunately, the decision was SHUTTERSTOCK / KLETR not in his favor. Determined not to take the failure laying down, the professor immediately, and at great extra expense I suspect—at least more than the cost of the ticket— wrapped up several silver dollar-size pieces of native lava rock and sent it to us with a detailed note explaining the superstitions surrounding all the bad luck to be endured by those who would remove lava from its island home. After opening this ominous package and reading the note I thought, “But I didn’t remove the lava from its home. You did.” I often wonder how life has been since the day this professor removed lava from the island of Hawaii. —Richard Babb Citation Assistant University of California, Berkeley
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A Perfect Storm
My story happens every year, and it’s about ladybugs. Every spring, the notices about blocked coinage in our meters increase a great deal. The culprit isn’t wayward quarters or stuck mechanisms, but ladybugs. It turns out, ladybugs really like going in to the coin holes of the meters. The journey can be more important than the destination. —Larry Cummings
Parking Control Officer University of Texas at Arlington
Operations Manager, Parking & Transportation Services Cleveland State University
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ISTOCK / ALE-KS
Deep Parking Thoughts
It was 10 minutes before curtain in the theater district, cold and snowing, and the height of the garage rush. I was making change with the cashiers, and a gentleman decided to get out of his car in the middle of the line and start yelling to ask me a question. He was walking toward me when he stepped on the curb, slipped, and fell. I ran to him. He was coherent and asked for an ambulance. I looked down and there it was—his ankle bone was poking out of his skin. So it’s a medical emergency and in the midst of cars coming in, his vehicle was parked in one lane and I was trying to get an ambulance through the other lane. The man started going into shock. Patrons were very helpful and gave us blankets to cover him up since he was laying in about an inch of snow and slush; due to protruding bone, we couldn’t move him. Our customers also stood around him so he wouldn’t get hit by a vehicle. I moved his car into the garage, out of the way, and we got him in the ambulance. The next day his girlfriend picked up the car and explained that he had to have surgery for his ankle. It was a perfect storm of events that night! —Christmas Mensah
The Memory Game When the University of California, Irvine, first began using license plate recognition to enforce parking at some of the housing communities, a resident approached one of the campus enforcement officers. The resident asked him, “Is it true that all residents have to register their license plate numbers in the system and that we won’t have to display a permit?” After the enforcement officer replied in the affirmative, the resident stated, “Well, I have a question I’ve been dying to ask you. How do you memorize all those license plate numbers?!” —Ronald M. Fleming
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Director, Transportation and Distribution Services University of California, Irvine
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Spatial Discernment Gone Awry A few years ago, we had one of those situations that has you asking, “Really?” One of our garages in the middle of campus has an entry clearance of six feet, eight inches. It is clearly marked and has a large PVC pipe over-height bar in place. Being in Texas, we fairly often have a tall truck or van that attempts to enter but will not fit into the garage and is required to back out. Most drivers know when they may be close and pay attention. Most. All but this one guy … One afternoon, I got a call from the officer working in the security booth who said that we had an issue at the entry to the garage. He asked me to come up and take a look. As I headed up the ramp and rounded the corner, I saw something I never thought I would see. There, wedged into the entrance of the garage, was a U-Haul truck. The cab of the truck was completely wedged and partially crumpled against the ceiling of the garage. The over-height bar had been knocked off its mounting and was about 30 feet on the other side of the entry gates from where it started. To make things even better, the driver had abandoned the truck. Fortunately for us, he left the keys in the ignition. However, the truck was so wedged that it would not budge when we tried to back it out. Long story short, we pulled the valve stems out of all the tires to completely deflate them and then had several good-sized guys stand on the bumpers to depress the truck’s springs. After much scraping on the ceiling, the truck finally came free. Fortunately, there was a small surface lot immediately across the street. We parked the truck there, called U-Haul, and asked them to come get their truck. —Dell Hamilton
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Manager, Transportation Services Texas A&M University
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