New speed bumps were installed in Parking Lots C and F over the summer semester out of speeding concerns raised by students and staff.
El Camino College has 10 official parking lots on campus. However, only Parking Lots C and F had speed bumps installed into them due to the higher amount of complaints and concerns over safety due to the level of speeding.
Chief of El Camino Police Michael Trevis said that a possible reason for those two parking lots in particular having speeding concerns is the amount of space in between parking spaces.
Trevis said about Lot F, “Certainly because, you know, how Lot F is, it spans along the entire channel. People have to drive over longer distances.”
The speed bumps themselves are made out of recycled materials, Trevis said. They are also glued down instead of bolted down like traditional speed bumps in the event that it is seen fit to remove them.
The speed bumps being glued down rather than bolted down however has caused problems, as the speed bumps in parking lot “C” on the first and third levels of the structure have begun to shift out of place. Contractors have since been notified to return and fix the issue.
Trevis said about the effectiveness of the speed bumps thus far, “The speed bumps certainly seems to have made people feel a little safer. The level of complaints we’ve been getting has slowed down.”
There are no plans as of now to install speed bumps in other parking lots on campus, despite the success of the speed bumps in Parking Lots C and F in reducing speeding and increasing safety. Trevis said that the others did not seem to have the need for them as much as Lots C and D did.
However, some members of the El Camino College Community believe that the speed bumps should be replaced for another kind.
Advisor for the Cooperative Agencies Resources for Education (CARE) at El Camino College Breeanna Bond, 29, said that the speed bumps as they are are “Necessary but too intense”. Bond also remarked that she believes the speed bumps are a cause for the traffic backups at Parking Lot C because they slow the pace of driving too much.
A student who frequently parks in Lot C, one Manda Alvarez, 27, English major, commented that the speed bumps were “so annoying”. Alvarez said that the speed bumps shouldn’t be removed, but instead replaced by speed bumps that are shorter and broader.
Trevis said that if people at El Camino College would like to get more involved in how the college addresses parking matters that there is a Parking Traffic Committee that meets on the last Wednesday of every month.
The next scheduled meeting of the Parking Traffic Committee is on Wednesday, Sept. 26 in the Library, Room 102.
