FSU trustees OK $300 a year overnight student parking permits

Starting this fall, Florida State University students can kiss free overnight parking on campus goodbye.

Here’s why: The no-cost service will now be a $300 optional annual fee for students.

FSU’s Board of Trustees voted Thursday to implement the optional overnight parking permit that will be sold to FSU students wishing to park any time between midnight and 5:45 a.m. on Mondays through Fridays. This means without the permit, students will no longer be able to park on campus overnight.

“I know every time we deal with parking, it leads to a lot of edginess, controversy and different opinions,” trustee Jorge Gonzalez said Thursday during a Finance and Business Committee meeting ahead of the full board’s approval.

“But this is something that appears to be creeping consensus in terms of the two goals that we have, which is to generate a little more revenue and also reduce the amount of overnight parking.”

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FSU students have a history of voicing frustrations related to the scarcity of parking on the university’s campus, and common issues include circling garages for an hour or more before rushing to class.

University efforts to alleviate the stressful hunt have included real-time information on parking availability, bike rack installations throughout campus and bus shuttle availability to transport students and staff to and from campus.

But parking still remains an around-the-clock issue for the campus community.

The large quantity of cars being parked overnight has a negative impact on faculty, staff and students as nearly one-third of campus parking spaces are occupied 24/7, which hampers daytime parking space availability.

“When I come to work, I often see several parking lots completely full with overnight parkers who are not located in a residence hall but have chosen to park there because of the availability,” FSU’s Senior Vice President for Finance & Administration Kyle Clark said.

There are currently more than 8,000 student parking spaces on campus, according to an FSU spokesperson, and there are six parking garages as well as smaller student parking lots scattered around the university's campus.

FSU students, including freshmen, can register for a regular parking permit for free while VRES (Virtual Reserved) permits can be purchased for $415 annually, allowing 24/7 parking in select garages. Faculty and staff have a similar VRES permit option, but at the cost of $580 per year on a first-come first-served basis, according to FSU Transportation and Parking Services.

The university issued 26,782 parking permits in the 2023-2024 fiscal year — a drop from 27,931 in the 2022-2023 fiscal year.

In addition, approximately 5,200 cars are parked at FSU overnight each weekday at no cost, with 4,200 belonging to university resident students while 1,000 belong to off-campus students. Overflow student overnight parkers can use faculty and staff parking spaces on campus before relocating by 7:30 a.m. on weekdays to avoid citations.

Currently, no permit is necessary to park overnight, but the overnight parking program will be an optional alternative to the free student parking program that will still be available to students for daytime parking.

Clark says the rapid increase of off-campus housing being built on FSU’s doorstep — where most are without adequate parking for their tenants — also contributes to the on-campus inconvenience.

“We have talked to the City of Tallahassee about working with developers in terms of encouraging them to have additional parking for the residents through developments off campus, but we see more and more students who are electing to keep their car on campus 24/7,” Clark said.

“It causes significant challenges with students who are commuting to campus,” he added.

Implementing the optional fee-based parking permit at a $300 annual rate per student is expected to lower demand for overnight parking to free up space for the university’s commuting populations.

The overnight parking program proposal was shared with FSU’s Student Government Association, which supported the initiative ahead of its approval at Thursday's full board meeting.

“I think this is a much greater solution to this issue of parking on campus,” said FSU Student Body President Jackson Boisvert, who also serves as a trustee on the board.

The goal is to reduce overnight parking on FSU’s campus by 25%, according to a university report.

The new parking plan was also approved in hopes of generating parking revenue — an estimated $1 million — and reinvesting it to improve parking and transportation programs and facilities.

FSU is “constantly evaluating transportation and parking services on campus” and looking for new ways to support students, faculty and staff by investing in new parking infrastructure and other transportation options, an FSU spokesperson said.

Contact Tarah Jean at tjean@tallahassee.com or follow her on X: @tarahjean_.

This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: FSU Board of Trustees approve $300 a year overnight parking permit