There will be no more freebies when it comes to parking in Penn State parking garages.
The university — which charges its employees $37 a month to drive to work and will charge fans $20 to park for the Blue-White game next spring — announced on Friday that with the installation of new equipment this summer, the East, Nittany and HUB parking decks will have 24-hour per day, seven days a week operations and parking fees. That means the East Deck, which previously employed free short-term parking for the convenience of Berkey Creamery customers, will implement a new short-term payment structure.
To park a vehicle in order to spend money at the Berkey Creamery, the fee will be pro-rated at 25 cents for each 15-minute interval up to the first hour and $1 per hour afterward.
Parking at Meyer Dairy on South Atherton Street remains free.
Aside from the pro-rated short-term rate in the East Deck, each of the three decks will require hourly parking fees at all times, so no free parking at night or on weekends as is often the case now. The university is installing new equipment that will allow the garages to operate more like those in downtown State College.
Credit cards will finally be accepted at each of the decks. New pay-on-foot stations are being installed which will allow use of all exit lanes for both permit holders and visitors. Electronic signage also will be installed.
Students, faculty and staff with permits for one of the decks will be contacted about receiving new permits.
For visitors, being required to pay to park at all times in those decks is a change, one which the school claims ‘will more fairly distribute the costs associated with maintaining parking facilities and operations.’
The project — which includes new in-lane equipment and gates, barcode readers, cameras, Voice over IP (VoIP – internet voice communications), level counting equipment and electronic signage and replacing existing gate equipment — is costing the university $1.8 million.
The equipment installation will take place through July and August
‘Evening, overnight and weekend parking will remain available at no charge in select campus lots, with information on these areas to be made available online,’ the release stated.
