Parking at the University of South

Florida

1
(Tired of USF Parking?, 2018)
From: Shailee Banskota

To: USF Parking & Transportation Services

Date: October 17th, 2021

Subject: The Process of Purchasing a Parking Permit

To whom it may concern:

Please find attached the draft for our analytical report entitled Parking at the University

of South Florida. USF is a national and internationally renowned school, and we want to

recognize its efforts on how it provides exceptional services for its students.

The attached report is an evaluation on the on the process of purchasing a parking permit

at the University of South Florida. I also touched on the increasingly relevant problems relating

to parking on campus in the report as well.

I believe that the process currently being utilized to .

Thank you for time and consideration and we look forward to hearing your input.

Sincerely,

Shailee Banskota.
 Acknowledgments

I would like to acknowledge and thank Professor Stewart for creating this assignment

allowing me to examine a process the University of South Florida is currently offering to its

student and faculty. I would also like to thank Kushal Tiwari for giving his time to aid me in my

investigation. Lastly, I would like to thank myself for completing this project without cutting any

corners and taking the time to examine this process more in depth.
 Table of Contents

Abstract............................................................................................................................................5

Introduction......................................................................................................................................6

Background………………………..…………………………………………………………….6-7

Methods/Procedures…………………………………………...................................................7-17

Discussion……………..................................................................................................................17

Discussion of Results................................................................................................................18-19

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………….19

Recommendations…………………………………….………………………………………….19

References…..................................................................................................................................20
 Abstract

Parking is a topic of discussion in all college campuses as it is so important to the

university. Parking can make or break a college for some people, and it is important for

universities to take into account the parking on their campus for not only students, but also the

university. For this reason, this report aims to look into the process of how students purchase a

parking permit to park on the University of South Florida, and how parking is beginning to be a

problem at the University of South Florida. I hope that this report will allow the USF Parking &

Transportation Services to take the parking permit process and parking situation at the University

more seriously.
 Introduction

Your campus parking experience can be wonderful to borderline impossible, depending

on your university. Students usually have to purchase a parking pass to allow them to park on

their campus, and the process to do so is typically similar throughout all colleges around the

United States. This report focuses on universities in Florida specifically, which all require

students to purchase their parking pass online via their college website. The ability to purchase

the parking pass online is due to the society being technologically advanced, allowing students to

do so. Having an online parking permit system means that there is no reason for physical permits

as well. If parking passes are virtual, there will be no worry for students to remember to put their

pass on their car, leading to parking citations. This also prevents people from sharing passes with

each other and causing issues for the parking and transportation services. The experience and

process of purchasing a permit had allowed for the parking and transportation services to

complete their goals, which I will discuss in the next section of the report.

Background

The entity that is in charge of the parking and transportation at the University of South

Florida is the Parking & Transportation Services of USF. My Project 1 instructions were about

purchasing a parking permit any of the USF campuses, thus, my audience for my proposal about

the issue of parking on campus will be the USF Parking & Transportation Services Department.

Their mission statement is to meet individual's parking and transportation needs in order to

continually enhance mobility and access to, from and within the university community. They

value responsive staff that solves problems by providing knowledgeable answers and fair and
balanced treatment. The Parking and Transportation Services support the university's vision,

strategies and goals by providing seamless, competitively priced parking and transportation

options that anticipate and meet the needs of the university community. They strive to be a

model in the Parking and Transportation industry, by using sound business practices, and

implementing current technology and training to meet the changing parking and transportation

needs of the University community. The department is responsible for the overall management of

the Bull Runner System and parking facilities and services. They provide guidance and

assistance to the USF community and guests with all their parking and transportation needs in a

professional and courteous manner. Both USF students and adult professionals work for

positions in the Parking & Transportation Services. I hope to reach this audience with this report

and inform them about the parking permit process at the University of South Florida.

Methods/Procedures

The process of purchasing a parking permit at USF is a process that is simple and

effective. The following steps describe how to purchase a parking permit.

 Discussion

I personally had to go through this process when purchasing a permit myself and while

partaking in this project. When I was purchasing a permit for myself, I found the process to be

very easy and quick as well. The entire process took me no more than 10 minutes, and I believe

it took me longer because I had to physically go and get the license information for all three of

the vehicles I was registering. If someone with only one vehicle were to go through this process,

it would undoubtedly take an even less amount of time. The layout of the process is designed

well as well. There are no harsh colors, distracting images, or unclear phrasing in any of their

entire purchasing process. A second time looking at the process, I found that all of the above was

still applicable and the process is still something that works very well with no issues for users

who are trying to purchasing a parking permit at USF.

 Discussion of Results

To determine if the parking permit process is a process that works well for new and old

users alike, there was a usability test that was done with a freshman student to determine its

usability. The freshman student, Kushal Tiwari, stated the following about the process:

“I was able to successfully buy the parking permit using the guide that Shailee

made. I actually am glad that Shailee came to me for this because I recently found

out that I needed to buy a permit after getting a new car, so I was the perfect

guinea pig for this project. I was satisfied with the instructions because it was

very easy to follow and the pictures made it clear what screen I should be looking

at during each of the steps. The guide did its job also, because I was able to buy a

parking permit, as the instructions wanted me to do. I thought that the most

helpful part of the instructions were the screenshots of the website each step of the

way when you are buying the permit on the USF website. The actual instructions

were also written nicely because I understood exactly what to do at each step. I

do not think there was something that interfered with my understanding of the

steps because I thought it was a great guide and I did not have any issues with it.

I thought the steps were clear and easy to follow. Each of the steps was one

sentence long so it made me feel good about each step being clear. I also thought

that again, the photos made it even easier to follow. I do not see any immediate

changes that I would make to this, I thought it was a great guide and that more

people, freshman and even other students could benefit from this”
From the usability test, it was determined that the current process for purchasing permit is a great

process that provides the exact services that it advertises to users.

Conclusion

The parking permit process is one that is convenient for all users at the University of

South Florida. The process allows students, employees, and visitors to have a seamless and easy

experience to park on campus. The process comes with many benefits, and has made the parking

on campus easier for the employees of the parking services as well. The process hopefully will

continue to develop and evolve as technology evolves and makes it easier to everyone at the

University of South Florida.

Recommendations

Although the process of purchasing the parking permit is currently working well, there

could be a few changes made to further develop the process. One thing that can be done is

relating to the design of the process on its website, which is enlarging some of the navigating

buttons. The buttons on the website that allows users to go forwards and backwards steps are

fully functioning, however, they are indeed a little small. The screen itself is large and the

website interface has a lot of white space, and having a small button does not help the user at all.

A simple solutions is to just make the buttons and the check boxes a little larger so that users are

able to clearly see them. Other than this recommendation, there is nothing else that needs

immediate attention in this process.

 References

Sweet, Nathaniel. “Tired of USF Parking?” Medium, The Blue Bull, 26 Feb. 2018,

https://medium.com/the-blue-bull/tired-of-usf-parking-5cc68c739260.