ASU is more than doubling the prices for some parking lots and structures for next year.
The University announces its new parking decal rates today. Parking decal renewal begins Monday.
The parking rates for the 2006-07 school year will range from $150 to $540.
Parking rates ranged from $75 to $240 this year.
Linda Riegel, Parking and Transit Services director, said the increase in rates was needed to improve PTS.
"At the current rates, we are not able to manage the current deficits in the parking program," she said.
With the additional funds, PTS can improve several areas of parking and transit, Riegel said.
Improvements include extending the FLASH bus service to midnight, adding a shuttle that would travel down McAllister Avenue, shuttle service to the Polytechnic and Downtown campuses and unlimited bus passes for students, she added.
Riegel also said the money would fund additional lighting in structures, gated exits, surveillance cameras, extra security patrols and bike corrals.
The improvements should cost about $4.6 million, she said.
The additional funding from the decal sales would only raise about $4.5 million, so PTS will dip into some of its revenue reserves, she added.
The improvement recommendations were sent to the University by a PTS-formed task force in January.
"[The task force] was looking for long-term solutions to parking on the Tempe campus," said Carol Campbell, vice president of business and finance.
Fourteen faculty, staff members and students made up the task force.
The task force surveyed nine focus groups, and the consensus was convenient parking was more important than price, Campbell said.
But some students are unhappy about the increases.
"I think it's ridiculous because people are already paying enough [for parking]," said Doug Schwimer, a justice studies sophomore.
Campbell said the University understands many students will be upset about the price increase.
"We fully realize that these rate increases are very large and are going to place a burden on people," she said.
Compared to other universities across the nation, the parking rates are low, Campbell added.
Structure parking at the University of Southern California ranges from $504 to $960, compared to ASU's new structure price range of $360 to $540.
Other schools that have more expensive structure parking rates include the University of California Los Angeles, UC Berkeley and the University of Minnesota, as well as many others.
But with the increases, ASU's structure parking would be more expensive than that of UA, Stanford, Washington State University and the University of Oklahoma, among others.
Schwimer said he plans to buy a decal for Structure 1 next year.
"That's a central location and most of my classes will be near there," he said.
Schwimer did not buy a decal this year but parked on campus anyway.
He said he would rather buy a decal than pay for another ticket to add to the 63 he has received since August 2004.
Parking will also be more crowded next year.
PTS will lose Lot 17 East and West and Lot 59 Northeast due to new developments, Riegel said.
A total of 5,000 spaces will be lost over the next several years, Riegel added.
Because of the lost spaces, the University is trying to get students and faculty to use mass transit.
"We began to realize really strongly that [ASU is] an urban center," Riegel said. "We need to look at urban solutions."
Those solutions included reduced rates for the light rail -- scheduled to open in 2008 -- park-and-ride locations and a carpool-matching service where people would be paired with other carpoolers, she added.
Journalism junior Shawna Lawless said most students would continue to drive to campus.
"People are going to be scrambling for parking when there is none," she said.
ASU also announced rates Thursday for parking lots and structures near the Downtown Phoenix campus, which opens in the fall.
Those decals, which range in price from $360 to $480, go on sale June 1.
Reach the reporter at kristi.eaton@asu.edu.
