Many Sartell students are frustrated with the parking lot situation at the end of the day, every single day, Monday through Friday.

The High School parking lot has been a controversial topic since it was created. As stated from a LeSabre article that went up about the SHS parking lot on March 10, 2020, “Students as a whole with the new facility expected a lot less headache when exiting at the end of the day, but clearly the new lot is posing issues for students.” The main problems being that it is non-functional, inefficient, and just overall bad.

According to Donaldson Law, “Every year, an average of 50,000 crashes happen in parking lots.”

A wide variety of students struggle using the parking lot from sophomores to parents. A survey of 140 Sartell students was conducted recently to get their thoughts and opinions on the parking lot system.

117 of those 140 students said they drive to school every day.  Many respondents had a lot to say about the problems they’ve encountered in the parking lot at the end of the day.  Some of the biggest problems that many students kept bringing up were that there weren’t enough exits in the parking lot, and the fact that all students are let out at the same time.  Students feel that this causes back-ups and jamming. 

Another problem students see is that people straight up just don’t know how to drive.  Sydney Sharp a junior who drives to school every day explained her thoughts:  “It’s horrible. They need more exits and the busses need to go out before the cars do because then it takes longer for the cars to get out.”

When asked about the parent pick-up line, Sharp shared, “Parents either try to shove their way through or they don’t know how to zipper merge!”

Which brings up another problem that students had a lot to say about: parents in the parking lot. Through the survey, many students expressed how parents cut people off, drive straight through the parking lot, and don’t know how the zipper merging system works.

LeSabre journalist, Hailey Keske has personally experienced with near accidents with parents twice in the same day trying to get out of the parking lot.

Though the parking lot system may now seem unfixable there are several solutions that students have come up with to help the situation.

Out of all of the responses received on this question, there were two very strong solutions to the parking lot problem that kept coming up. The first was to have more exits for the parking lot so it’s less jammed and cars can get out faster and more orderly. The second was to let students out in sections at staggering times toward the end of the day.

To be more specific one student said,  “I think there needs to be a separate way for students who drive and students who are being picked up to exit the parking lot. Just cutting down on some of that overlap would not only make the parking lot safe, but also more efficient.”

Another student said, “Instead of letting everyone leave at once. You should let classes leave the school in levels like Pines leaves at 3:15 and Watab leaves at 3:20, something like that. I feel like that would make the parking lot way safer and easier to get out of.”