The KSU Facility Services Department is considering creating new parking options off campus to leave room for educational facilities on campus grounds. The facilities department has worked with the DumontJanks company to develop a master plan for the newly consolidated university.
After surveying and gathering data from both the Kennesaw and the Marietta campuses, the DumontJanks company presented their research in the Carmichael Student Center Monday Jan. 25.
They said their research began last Sept., and they have surveyed just under 1,000 students.
This semester, they say they will begin creating a master plan with KSU, which they hope to implement during the sumer 2016 semester.
“It’s been a very fresh and raw transition, ” said John Perry, a landscape architect from DumontJanks. “It’s a very unique situation.”
KSU students, faculty and staff were surveyed on various topics including campus safety, WiFi, parking, social space on campus, biking routes, driving routes, and pedestrian routes.
Parking and campus safety had some of the most negative comments from KSU students and faculty. According to DumontJank’s surveys, places that students and faculty felt unsafe in are scattered all across the Kennesaw campus. DumontJanks said that improving campus lighting is on their agenda. It was also mentioned in Monday’s meeting that the Marietta campus has even less lighting than the Kennesaw campus.
According to DumontJank’s research, 38 percent of the space of the Kennesaw’s campus and 37 percent of the space of the Marietta campus has no use. Perry said KSU has a lot of room to build for academics. Sixteen percent of the space on the Kennesaw campus is used for parking, and the Marietta campus uses 12 percent for parking.
While there have been complaints about parking, John Anderson from KSU’s facilities department said parking management has improved.
In the meeting Perry suggested “a better circulation in the shuttle system that provides better incentive for moving some of the parking to remote locations.” Gregory Janks from the DumontJanks company added that this is a strategy many bigger universities use.
“The short answer is no, we are not looking to take away parking,” Janks said.
“When many universities start, they are very communal oriented, and as they get bigger and bigger, that kind of begins to change, Janks said. “As you begin to look at some of the other 50 biggest universities in the country, they tend to some of the parking, and those tend to move toward the periphery.”
