Roads narrowed by heavy snow this winter led the city of St. Paul to restrict parking to the odd-numbered side of all residential streets, leaving some St. Thomas students in search of already-limited parking near campus.

As a result of the ban which started Monday, parking has been barred on the south sides of Selby and Goodrich Avenues and the east side of Finn Street. St. Thomas students who keep their cars on residential streets near campus are still adjusting to the restriction.

“It’s just inconvenient at the most,” freshman Thomas Kahle said. “I’ll have to leave like 10 minutes earlier to walk to my car and even earlier than that because the roads are so bad, so now I have to factor that into it.”

Extreme weather has prevented sufficient clearing of local streets, making it difficult for emergency vehicles to respond quickly, according to the city of St. Paul. On March 1, St. Paul parking enforcement placed warnings on cars still parked on the even-numbered sides of residential streets, and towed and ticketed them if they hadn’t moved by March 3.

According to Diana Kaardal, manager of operations for Parking Services, St. Thomas has enough trouble clearing its own lots. The university is not changing anything as result of the ban.

“It gets harder and harder because we have parking spaces that we lose to the snow,” Kaardal said. “That pushes the cars further and further out. It’s a challenge. They have to find new places to put the snow.”

Kaardal recommended that students, staff and faculty who are struggling to find a place to park purchase a parking permit.

“We do have permits that are still available. That’s really going to be the easiest and safest bet right now,” Kaardal said. “I think that’s going to be a lot easier than trying to hunt around and getting ticketed and towed.”

Despite the trouble, Kahle said he is not interested in buying a parking permit this late in the semester.

“It’s definitely something that maybe I wish I would have bought at the beginning of the year,” Kahle said. “It would definitely be more convenient to just have a parking spot on campus.”

Junior Jojo Younce commutes to campus every day, and she said has had a parking permit since the beginning of the school year. She said the convenience of parking on campus is worth it.

“It definitely decreases a lot of stress for me, just knowing that I’ll have somewhere to park,” Younce said.

Even though Younce has the ease of parking on campus, she understands the difficulty for those who park on streets now that the ban has been put in place.

“It sucks a lot because obviously people would park there, and now they can’t, so people are wondering where to go because there are such few parking spots,” Younce said. “At the same time, it’s really dangerous to try and keep those parking spots open when the streets are smaller and smaller.”

The city has not set an end date for the ban, and said that the restriction will last until “warmer temperatures warrant a change.”

Frustrated by the indefinite state of the parking ban, Kahle said he would like to see a more proactive snow removal program.

“What I’m wondering is why don’t they try to plow or get a crew out and make the streets a little bit wider and get rid of some of that snow instead of just saying, ‘We’re going to wait for the snow to melt down,’” Kahle said. “That’s a whole month of inconvenience of having to leave early and planning my day around something like that.”

For more information on parking restrictions visit www.stpaul.gov.

Simeon Lancaster can be reached at lanc4637@stthomas.edu.