It is no secret that UCSD is starting to bust at the seams with students and their cars. Every year, UCSD admits more students than campus facilities can comfortably serve. The good news is that there is a plan to help expand this campus in order to accomodate students, staff and visitors. The bad news is that it may not actually improve life for undergraduate students at UCSD.

The UCSD Master Plan is a long-range vision for construction at UCSD. The plans contained within it are already well under way with new buildings springing up all over campus. As these buildings appear, “”S”” parking spaces disappear at an even greater rate, forcing more students to park on UCSD’s inconvenient East Campus. But there is a method to the madness: It is all a part of the UCSD Master Plan. According to the plan, by the year 2005, all undergraduate parking will be on East Campus.

There is already a great deal of parking on East Campus. The students who choose to park there are making a trade-off: In exchange for parking, they are sacrificing the safety of their cars and their contents, as well as the possibility of spending less than 20 minutes getting to class after arriving to school.

If the administration plans to eventually move all undergraduate parking to this remote part of campus, it needs to do two things. First, the administration needs to plan for increased security in this part of campus so students don’t have to worry about their cars being stolen while they are in class. Second, the administration needs to plan to expand and improve the shuttle system. Shuttles will have to run to every lot on East Campus, and they will need to run 24 hours a day because of the aforementioned safety issue. Many students stay on campus studying or working with student organizations after the East Campus parking shuttles stop running at 1:15 a.m.

With these considerations, the UCSD Master Plan can fulfill its potential to make UCSD a more convenient place for higher learning.