As more students get their driver’s licenses throughout the school year, there’s a rising issue with the number of parking spots at Pine Creek. There are not enough parking spots for Pine Creek students who drive. This comes after the 2024-2025 school year’s new parking rules, in which students have to purchase a permit for a designated spot.
The influx of students caught Pine Creek administrators off guard. “We were not expecting to sell a permit for all 562 student spots this year, so it has created a little bit of confusion overall,” said Assistant Principal Matt Mahan. They have tried to come up with solutions, “We opened 69 other spots in the staff lot for students,” said Mahan. When students graduated at semester, this opened a few spots, but not nearly enough for the waiting list which currently has over 30 students waitlisted.
In addition, sophomores are frustrated, “I think it’s annoying because I can finally drive but I can’t park here [Pine Creek] so I still have to ride the bus,” said Grant Boyle (10). Students who thought they would be able to drive to school, can’t and have to find other options that might be more inefficient. On top of that, if students have after-school activities and need to put sports equipment or an instrument in their car, they can not.
However, some students don’t mind the change and think it’s beneficial. “I like it,” said Humzah Khan (11), “You get your own spot and do not have to worry about someone stealing your spot.” This is a good point given that now if someone were to take your spot, you could go to security and they would know the exact spot. It was also to control traffic in the area and help students not stress over finding a spot.
In short, the parking lot is too small for a school of Pine Creek’s size, and is essential to explore different solutions. According to Aleksandr Christ, from Talon Media, Principal Bierman said, “The fear of change is harder than what the impact has been,” and this is from the new rules at the beginning of the school year. But now, the impact of this has parked in our spot.
