The Department of Transportation Services will likely raise parking meter fees to cover the cost of technologically advanced meters that notify drivers via text message when time is running low and allow them to add money over the phone.

The meters, which will serve multiple parking spaces, will be installed this summer and cost the department more than $200,000, said DOTS Director David Allen. The price of parking at meters will increase to cover the expense, as well as other financial holes in the DOTS budget, he added.

Meters in open parking lots will cost $2 an hour and garages will cost $3 an hour, a $1 increase from their respective amounts. Allen said the meters should pay for themselves in the first year because of the higher parking costs and savings from not needing to employ tellers or manually collect coins from each meter.

Dan Leydorf, the Residence Hall Association Student Group and Organization Liaison, serves on the executive board that will ultimately vote to approve the parking meter fee increase. Leydorf said he does not expect the higher costs to deter students or visitors from parking at the meters.

“I don’t think that the increase in visitor parking fees and parking meter fees will negatively impact students, and I think that these increases are in some ways necessary,” Leydorf said. “What we are seeing now is a roll back on the number of parking spaces on campus that are usable, so by increasing the fees they are just reacting to the decrease in the number of available parking spaces.”

Several construction projects currently in progress, including Knight Hall and South Campus Commons 7, have reduced the number of available parking spaces on the campus.

Despite the plans to buy new parking meters, add a new bus route to New Carrollton and eventually buy more hybrid buses, Allen does not plan to ask for an increase in student fees for the 2009-2010 academic year.

According to preliminary estimates, the new parking meters will save the university more than $280,000 per year, Allen said, adding that there could be even more savings from not having to manually collect money from the meters, which accept credit and debit cards.

Allen said the department also wants to recoup money lost as a result of the “friendly ticket” policy, which automatically grants drivers a pardon for their first parking ticket on the campus. He estimates the policy costs the department about $350,000 per year.

“I think now is the time to move in this direction, and to save at least $280,000,” Allen said. “It could even be $100,000 more than estimated because I believe that we will save a lot of money on the collection of meters, because [the current meters] have to be collected manually and have only a certain amount of money they can hold.”

Allen said he expects an upsurge in usage because people would be able to pay for the meters in cash, credit, debit or coins. Drivers can also create an account that will alert them by text message when their meter is running out and allow them to pay over the phone from another part of the campus.

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