Parking Solution Needed at College

As residents of the Santa Monica College neighborhood for 44 years, we have become increasingly upset over the growth of the college and the lack of adequate parking for the students.

It is time the college and the city take action to alleviate the situation and provide some solution. The idea of reserving certain parking lots for car pools is a good one, and a shuttle system could be worked out, as it has been at UCLA. Students should be encouraged to utilize the three bus routes that serve the college and also to use the upper levels of the parking building, which are sometimes almost empty.

Perhaps the only way to get action is to have preferential parking for the residents within a two-block radius of the college. The traffic noise, burglar alarms going off at all hours and lunch-bag pollution has become unbearable, to say nothing of the kids racing around to find spaces.

The idea of putting parking spaces in the center of Pearl Street is not a solution. There is a very wide parking strip on the south side of Pearl between 17th Street and the college parking lot that might be used for a few more spaces, but both would be a drop in the bucket.

Preferential parking is the answer.

HAROLD Z. BUCK

Santa Monica