Parking Action Plan
Overview
The Challenge: Significant Loss of Parking
North Carolina State University (NC State) is preparing for significant transformation as a portion of the aging Coliseum Deck is retired and the 2023 Physical Master Plan (PMP) moves from vision to action. Over the next decade, new housing developments, academic facilities, and student gathering spaces will be added to support the university’s long-term vision — a connected campus that prioritizes pedestrians, cyclists, and other micro-mobility options, and that creates meaningful gathering spaces that enhance campus life.
However, these planned changes will also present critical parking and campus access challenges. Over the next five years, NC State is projected to lose between 1,700 and 2,000 parking spaces, driven by three concurrent priorities:
- Planned retirement and demolition of a portion of the Coliseum Deck, a well-utilized parking asset in the heart of campus (approximately 1,100 spaces lost);
- Redevelopment of Cates West, which will repurpose existing surface parking lots (approximately 600 spaces lost); and
- PMP goals of enhancing pedestrian and bicycle mobility (approximately 100 spaces lost).
The Opportunity: Parking Action Plan
The Parking Action Plan (Plan) is NC State Transportation’s strategy to navigate loss of the Coliseum Deck, support Physical Master Plan implementation and manage the resulting changes to the campus parking supply. It is a roadmap for the next 5-10 years to mitigate parking losses, where reasonable, through strategic investment in new parking supply and enhanced multi-modal offerings.
Parking Action Plan
Operational Needs Assessment
The Assessment combined a thorough desk review of existing NC State Transportation policies, programming, service delivery and financial health, along with staff interviews and field observations during an on-site visit conducted September 30 – October 1, 2025.
Data Collection & Analysis
To support the Plan, a parking utilization study of all facilities on NC State’s Main Campus was conducted using drone imagery, mobile License Plate Recognition (LPR), and historical occupancy data of the parking decks. Findings show that daily demand peaks between 9:00 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. in line with class schedules, with deck occupancy reaching 84 to 89 percent during the elevated surge of the first two weeks of the fall semester. Otherwise, typical mid-semester occupancy stays between 71 and 72 percent, leaving available capacity to absorb some displaced parkers.
Campus Stakeholder Engagement
Three values — affordability, availability, and convenience — were used to help students, faculty, and staff weigh the tradeoffs of upcoming changes driven by both the planned retirement of aging infrastructure and the operationalization of Physical Master Plan recommendations. Campus engagement for the Plan was structured around this value-based framework, asking the campus community to consider what mattered most about parking and access.
Each value was presented with benefits and tradeoffs, including increased parking fees, changes to current parking privileges/access, and shifts in commuting behavior among students, faculty, and staff. Campus outreach included presentations to the Transportation Stakeholders Group and the Faculty, Staff and Student Senates; a project webpage; and an online feedback form.
Availability was the top priority across all stakeholder groups. Existing parking supply is already perceived as insufficient, and reducing inventory without replacement was widely seen as unacceptable.
Salary-based permit pricing was evaluated to address affordability; however, study findings led to the decision not to move forward with this approach. Instead, NC State Transportation is committed to focusing on direct alternatives to maintain affordable and accessible options across campus:
- Expand options for off-peak low-cost permits (eg, “L”)
- Expand transit to park-and-rides
- Work with Facilities and Dining to develop tailored permits for second and third shift employees
- Increase the number of spaces devoted to low-cost permits
Financial Modeling
Three financial models were developed for the Plan, each corresponding to replacement of some, most, or more than the number of parking spaces that will be lost through Coliseum Deck demolition and redevelopment of Cates West. The models were designed to provide financial context for three scenarios: Low Build (300-500 new spaces), Medium Build (700-1,100 new spaces), and High Build (1,700-2,400 new spaces).
An average cost per space of $35,000 was used, based on review of recent regional parking deck developments. Each model also included annual operating costs, with additional assumptions accounting for soft costs and contingencies across a 30-year project horizon. Anticipated capital investment ranged from $10-$20 million for the Low Build scenario to $70-$100 million for the High Build scenario.
Each scenario considered overall project cost, funding options (e.g., university financing, existing Transportation reserve funds), anticipated parking permit fee increases, elimination of parking privileges for some user groups (e.g., first year students), and the ability to reprogram existing parking assets.
While project cost is a paramount consideration for NC State Transportation and the stakeholders it serves, scenario planning surfaced several broader elements of the campus parking and access experience that warranted attention in the planning process, including:
- Availability of parking permits
- Access to parking in the heart of campus
- Intercampus movement
- Use of other modes (e.g., walking, biking, transit)
- Overall quality of the campus access experience
Implementation Roadmap
Informed by the 8-month comprehensive planning process summarized above, an Implementation Roadmap was created to guide the following activities:
Short-Term Mitigation
- Perform an updated structural assessment to confirm demolition timeline of existing Coliseum Deck.
- Using a combination of Transportation reserves and university financing, build one new 1,100 space parking structure on the existing Coliseum Deck site.
- If university financing is not available, use Transportation reserves to build one new, smaller structure.
- Reprogram existing parking assets to support temporary parking space loss and/or replacement.
- Prepare for expansion of multi-modal options, including transit, bicycle, and pedestrian improvements.
- Address key operational considerations before, during and after both the Coliseum Deck and Cates West projects.
Long-Term Mitigation
- Mitigate anticipated long-term loss of 695 total spaces.
This roadmap is not without cost or compromise. However, NC State Transportation is committed to transparency, proactive communication and thoughtful decision-making throughout the process to retire aging infrastructure and operationalize the vision outlined in the Physical Master Plan.