UNCP to add additional handicap parking places

By Lee Whitworth
Staff Photographer

The lack of sufficient handicap parking spaces near all the buildings is a serious problem on campus. In investigating the handicap spaces, I found out that there are more than 60 spaces around campus and that should be more than enough, but let’s look at where they are.

Eight are accessible from Dial, six are in the commuter’s parking lot, two are in front of Dial at the visitor’s one-hour parking, with two more opposite them. There are six that are near Lumbee Hall, two beside it and the four in the visitor’s one-hour parking.

There is one in the visitor’s parking at Givens and five more between Chavis and Givens. On the other side of Chavis, there’s two up close and two by Lowery.

Behind the Business Building, five spaces allow access to the Education Building, also. At Student Health Services there are two more. At the back of the Library and in front of Old Main and the Oxendine Building there are six, four at Old Main, two on either side of the walkway and two out back at the Library.

The Jones Athletics Building has four behind it and four more on the side near the Auxiliary Services. There are four at Pine Hall. There also are seven in the construction area, six at the soccer fields, three at the daycare and five at the church.

If we take away all the handicap parking spaces that are more than 50 yards from the building a student needs, or are blocked by construction, that leaves only 37 handicap parking spaces to serve the handicapped students, faculty and staff.

The Oxendine Building, for example, in my opinion needs more because it’s now three stories and has many students attending it.

One reason a handicap parking permit is issued is because a person cannot walk a long distance. Walking from Chavis to the Lowery Building for tutoring class, or parking across the street at the church and walking to Lowery are not options. My doctor, for example, doesn’t want me walking that far on any given day.

It’s also difficult to pick my classes closer together so I wouldn’t have to walk so far. For example, English classes meet in Dial and Math and Computer Science classes meet in Oxendine. How can those classes ever be closer together?

The Traffic Control Board of the university met on Nov. 9 to discuss the handicap parking problem among other things. The North Carolina State Building Code for Educational Facilities states that accessible parking spaces to accessible entrances cannot exceed 200 feet.

Director of Disability Support Services Mary Helen Walker noted that other campuses who cannot make their entrances accessible have developed a shuttle service for students. She provided a statement that UNCP has every intention to have ADA compliant parking conditions. If there is a problem, she said, we certainly want to know about it. Please contact Larry Rodgers with any concerns you would like to have investigated and, if necessary, we will correct them.

As a result of the Nov. 9 meeting of the Traffic Control Board, chair Larry W. Rodgers recommended to the university that four more temporary handicap parking spaces be added—one in front of Wellons and three in front of Old Main/Oxendine to make up for lost spaces in the temporarily closed parking lots.

Now that the Traffic Control Board has made this recommendation, it’s my opinion that UNCP is trying to do everything that it can to accommodate the handicapped with better parking that is accessible to the buildings.