No parking spots for residents in potential dorm

ASU's Newman Center wants to make downtown Tempe home to 432 students in a high-rise dorm without building a single new parking space for those additional residents. The idea seems to fly in the face of Tempe's effort to require far more parking in new downtown developments than it had in the past.

But it's in perfect synch with Arizona State University's plan to reduce the number of cars on its main campus as it replaces surface parking lots with buildings. ASU officials hope that many of the people who live, work and study in those buildings won't drive to get there.

A 22-story tower with zero on-site parking would be a first for Tempe and at least initially seems like an idea that would make downtown's tight parking situation even worse.

But planning officials say the rules they normally apply to parking don't make sense in this case. City planners are willing to waive parking standards for the building because they agree with a parking study that found unusually low rates of car ownership for this kind of community.

College students are more likely to give up cars because of growing environmental concerns, rising gas prices and easy access transit like the Metro light-rail line, said Chris Anaradian, Tempe's development services manager. Plus, the site is surrounded by ASU property.

"This is about people who are in college - full-time college students on the Tempe campus," Anaradian said. "This isn't about somebody who is working at the mall and commuting to (Mesa Community College). That person will probably live someplace else in our community, but they wouldn't live here."

The student housing tower proposal is part of the Newman Center's plans to tear down the dated and cramped 1960s chapel and office building. They currently sit beside and behind the 1903 St. Mary's Church on the corner of University Drive and College Avenue. The historic church would remain.

Parishioners had raised about $6 million to rebuild the offices and chapel last year, when Domus Communities of Kansas City proposed building them and the tower. The private company would finance construction and operate what would be the largest student housing development catering to Catholics at a public university.

Domus considered underground parking, but it would have cost $40,000 per space, said Tim Lies, the company's president.

He notes parking is still available. The center has decades-long leases for 147 spaces in nearby lots. Normal downtown standards would have required 530 spaces.

Lies said the new Orbit circulator buses in downtown Tempe can carry students to many places in the city, and the Metro line can take them beyond that. The housing project would also rent cars to students who can't make particular trips on transit. This concept wouldn't have worked years ago, Lies said, but makes sense today.

"The landscape changes and Tempe is growing up and becoming a world-class city," he said.

The university has committed to reduce carbon emissions while also taking steps to offset emissions it continues to produce.

Having fewer vehicles powered by combustion engines on campus is a key part of that effort, said Raymond Humbert, associate director of ASU's parking and transit department.

ASU is one of the nation's fastest-growing universities, forcing it to add buildings to accommodate that growth.

"On any college campus, any parking lot is nothing more than a building waiting to happening," Humbert said.

Overall, the number of parking spaces at the Tempe campus has declined to about 18,000, from 19,600 in 2006.

ASU also has dramatically increased the price of parking.

A parking pass for Lot 16, located at the southeast corner of Mill Avenue and University Drive, costs $600 a year, said Shereen Saurey, an ASU parking and transit spokeswoman. Two years ago, the price was $240.

The higher prices have reduced demand. ASU sold about 27,000 parking permits during the 2005-06 school year, but only 23,000 this school year, Saurey said.