LSU to charge for on campus parking in 2011

quote:

---

BATON ROUGE - Beginning with the 2011 LSU football season, there will be a charge to park in most lots west of Highland Road on the LSU campus on football game days in order to provide additional services to fans and to offset financial losses caused by budget cuts to the University.

The affected lots are in the Highland Road and Tower Drive areas as well as lots on River Road (Levee Lot) and Gourrier Avenue (Hayfield Lot), plus a parking lot on the golf course Old Front Nine. Access to these lots will be sold on a first-come, first-served and game to game basis, allowing current users in those lots to continue to park in the areas they are accustomed to using.

The revenue generated from the new charges will allow LSU to make more restroom facilities available to those areas and help with rising clean-up costs due to heavy tailgating activities in those areas. Also, it will help offset the financial impact on the athletic department resulting from budget cuts to the university. Recently the athletic department has taken on an additional $1.4 million in expenses from the university as a direct result of state budget reductions.

The controlled area will be most campus parking lots east of river road, west of Highland Road, north of Gourrier Avenue/Burbank Drive and south of West Chimes Street. All existing reserved lots will remain in force at the same cost as the 2010 season.

The cost of game day parking permits for the Highland Road and Tower Drive lots will be $40 per game while parking in the Levee, Hayfield and Old Front Nine lots will be $20 per game. Various sales locations will be open on Friday nights to purchase permits to the Highland Road and Tower Drive lots, and game day sales will begin at approximately 5 a.m. on Saturdays for all lots.

In addition, due to the proliferation of utility trailers that are being brought onto the campus, there will be a per game charge of $50 per utility trailer.

For more information and a map of campus parking lots, fans can go to www.LSUsports.net/2011parking.

---