Provost Message - August 17, 2016

Welcome Message from Provost Jersky

Welcome to the 2016-17 academic year! I hope you have had a productive, enjoyable summer. 

We begin the year welcoming our new tenure track faculty members at Convocation on Friday. We have 62 new faculty members starting this fall and four more starting in 2017. I hope you will join President Conoley and me at Convocation to greet this new cohort, reconnect with colleagues and look at the year ahead. 

Next week we will welcome 4,200 freshmen and 3,800 transfer students to campus. Our total projected headcount is 37,600 – slightly higher than Fall 2015. The number of full-time equivalent students is expected to be 31,400 – the highest in CSULB’s history. About 27,200 continuing students will return. 

With that many students on campus, parking will be a challenge. Parking and Transportation Services has been working throughout the summer on projects designed to make it easier to get around campus. You can learn about these efforts as well as tips for navigating campus next week below. 

My first two months on campus have reaffirmed my initial impressions of The Beach. This is an outstanding university with dedicated, talented and smart faculty and staff. I look forward to working with you this academic year as we build on the excellent foundation you have already established. 

-Brian

Getting Around Campus

During the first weeks of each semester CSULB experiences a high volume of vehicular traffic and campus roadway use. If you are unable to take an alternative form of transportation, we recommend arriving early, avoiding the most highly congested areas and taking the most direct route to parking. 

Peak times of congestion are from 7 a.m.-10 a.m. and 3 p.m.-5:30 p.m., Monday through Thursday. During these times we recommend avoiding the 7th Street entrance at West Campus Drive unless you are parking in Lots 4, 5, 6 or 7 and avoiding Merriam Way unless you are parking in Lots 3, 15, 17, 18 or Parking Structure 1. Learn more.

Additional Parking Available August 22-25

Bypass campus traffic all together during the first week of the semester by going directly to our offsite parking lot with free shuttle service to campus. Overflow parking will be provided August 22-25, 7 a.m.-7 p.m. at the nearby Greek Orthodox Church less than 1 mile from campus. Free shuttle services are provided and will depart to campus every 20 minutes (top of every hour, 20 minutes past the hour and 40 minutes past the hour). Shuttles will drop off directly in front of the McIntosh Humanities Building on upper campus. Find out more.

Parking Lot Reconfiguration

CSULB has reconfigured certain designated lots around the campus to ease navigation, reduce citations and improve the campus community parking experience. These changes include:

Streamlining lot usage by creating single-use lots wherever possible
Eliminating designated carpool spaces because they were not effectively used, and
Consolidating short-term parking (previously called “Pay-By-Space”) into Lots 1, 8A, 11C, 16, 17 and the South Campus Turnaround.

All changes can be found on the parking reconfiguration web page and can now also be viewed on the updated campus map. Also please note that other inducements to encourage carpooling remain in place.

Lot 7 will open August 22

Lot 7 will be open for use on August 22. The new lot will feature 152 additional employee parking spaces, upgraded parking pay stations, and an improved layout for optimal traffic flow.

License Plate Recognition is Live

On August 15, CSULB officially launched the new parking system, License Plate Recognition (LPR). If you have not already done so, please ensure your vehicle information is correct in MyCSULB to avoid an unnecessary citation. Log in to MyCSULB and click on the link labeled “Manage Parking.” For additional questions, please contact the LPR info line at ext. 5-8292.