5 comments by 1 or more people

1. Bastards. Quite literally.

   19 Sep 2006, 23:25

2. It’s hardly surprising. It won’t be long before the University starts charging people to breathe air on campus.

   20 Sep 2006, 02:21

3. In fairness, this isn’t really new news – this was posted on 7th September and the car park will be available to Warwick Sport members as well as permit holders.

   That link also states that “The University has made a commitment to incrementally eliminating free car parking spaces on campus. This will be done in conjunction with the development and implementation of a Green Transport Policy.” which I personally reckon isn’t all that unreasonable in the long term, in terms of the environmental arguments.

   20 Sep 2006, 09:10

4. Hero

   This is rubbish about the ‘Green Transport policy’ the new VC’s ‘genius’ idea for charging for all cars is copied from his previous institution. Not as a green policy (there are millions of other ways to dissuade people from car use – on-site car pools, car sharing networks (see Orange as a company who uses an organised version of this for its sites), subsidised short-route buses etc. A more sensible approach would be to offer free permits to staff/students living more than 15 minutes walk from a connecting bus route for example.

   The main problem with the false green argument is the ‘once you have one’ argument. I have a bus season ticket, and therefore I have an incentive to use the bus as much as possible. If you have a parking permit, there is a clear incentive to keep using it to get your money’s worth.

   Better solutions from the green perspective would be to restrict the parking of vehicles with more than 1.1 litre engines. (or less) Free if you have a tiny runabout (usually smaller as well, space management fans!), expensive if you insist on driving a big car for shallow status reasons and screwing up all the savings made by small car users.

   The ‘greenness’ argument is rubbish – this VC sees this as his pat-on-the-back revenue stream. Silly really there is much more money available from other sources.

   20 Sep 2006, 10:23

5. Richard Wilson

   As Jonny Adcock notes in the Boar (25 Oct – The dawn of a new traffic problem?), the original development plan for the University included a dual carriageway linking us with the A46. Though i’m all for a truly green (rather than a money-making) solution to the problem, the cause of the ridiculous amount of congestion over the years is the failure to implement the original plan. The current policy of progressively pricing poorer members of our community off the campus is unfair and a double-whammy to those of us who live in one of the many pockets of public transport desert forcing us into our cars. A modest park & ride scheme would take care of our interests but is presumably deemed not cost effective.

   09 Nov 2007, 11:00