The same day The Crimson White’s Editorial Board cosigned the argument that charging for parking is morally wrong, its news desk reported a University of Alabama student had been killed by a driver while crossing the street. While advocating for policy reforms, we must not forget that car culture has a real body count.
Of course, I wholeheartedly agree with the Editorial Board, and the contributing columnist who inspired them, that UA workers deserve more from their employer. That’s why I supported the United Campus Workers of Alabama while I was a UA student, and why I joined up myself and started paying dues the second I was hired as this paper’s opinions editor. But for reasons I first explained in my fifth ever article for The CW back in 2023, making parking free for student workers, faculty and staff would be a policy nightmare.
The true effects of such a radical change wouldn’t be limited to making workers who are forced to commute to campus better off. By reducing the cost of driving relative to alternatives, making parking free would actively encourage people who otherwise would walk, bike, carpool or take the bus to drive instead — leading to more traffic, more demand for parking than the available supply and more pollution.
Every extra parking space is more space that cannot be used to build new apartments within walking distance of campus, or host local flora and fauna.
And as the late economist Donald Shoup observed, every free space is in effect a massive subsidy for those people who choose to spew exhaust fumes and tire wear particles into the local atmosphere. Even though at present parking is hardly free at the University, it is far cheaper than the market rate in almost all major American cities.
The Editorial Board laments that “for both nine month and 12 month employees, the cost of a parking pass ranges from $345-680.” (The cost is actually below this range for those who need accessible parking.) This really means the monthly cost of a regular faculty and staff parking permit is just $38.34 for a nine month employee, or $28.75 for a 12 month employee: less than a couple of bucks per work day.
A recent report on parking prices in the 38 most populated American cities showed only the cheapest parking in Tulsa, at $21.70 a month, is below the price of parking on campus. In the 37 other cities, the lowest prices ranged from slightly above the cost for a nine month employee to oodles and oodles higher. Parking in the Tuscaloosa Intermodal Facility might be free, and other universities may subsidize drivers even more, but these are lazy comparisons and shoddy ways to determine whether the costs of parking permits are fair or not.
Given the significant opportunity cost of having massive asphalt lakes cover the very heart of campus as well as the many millions the University spends building parking, whether it is abusing its market power or just recouping costs ought to be an open question rather than an assumption. A question, that is, which The CW’s Editorial Board ought to have tried to rigorously answer before signing off on suggestions for sweeping policy changes.
Making parking free for UA employees would also naturally be a nightmare on equity grounds. Having a personal automobile is a massive expense. By handing out parking passes to every UA worker, the administration would help workers who already could afford a car. But it would leave the folks who have to bike or walk to work for budgetary reasons exactly where they were before.
Even though workers are being squeezed by The University of Alabama, the solution isn’t mounting some idealistic pressure campaign to make parking free. The proper course of action is pressuring the administration to raise wages.
A worker with a guaranteed free parking pass is only better off if they drive, and their driving is likely leaving everyone else worse off. A worker with an extra $345 to $680 — the cost per pass recipient faced by the administration for making parking free — could choose to purchase a parking pass. Or they could rent a place closer to campus and walk. Or keep taking the bus and save more money for their kid’s college fund.
Workers in Tuscaloosa who are understandably hurting right now shouldn’t join a car club and write open letters demanding free parking. They should join a union and demand higher wages.
Chance Phillips is a 2024 graduate of The University of Alabama and currently a Ph.D. student at UMass Amherst. He served as the CW Opinions Editor in 2024.
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