The students’ organisation PULSE has expressed its concern about the new parking system at the university to be introduced at the beginning of the next scholastic year in October.

At a press conference held at the university, PULSE president Randolph De Battista explained how this new parking system would negatively affect students who use their own cars to attend university. He also explained how the parking would be divided between the students, lecturers and other staff.

He said that from the 1,356 parking spaces available, 443 would be available to students, 522 to administrative and technical workers and 400 reserved for lecturers.

De Battista added that this modification makes for a more controlled in the parking system as it ensures that the parking spaces will only used by people who are at university, and not by visitors to Mater Dei Hospital.

The system adopted in previous years was not controlled, but students were able to make use of almost all the parking spaces available on a first come first served basis. This was already a problem since many students did not find parking spaces available, which many times led them not being allowed into lecture rooms due to being late after struggling to find a parking space.

With this new system, the students will have only 443 parking spaces available t them, which means that greater problems will arise.

A positive and important aspect is that direct buses are now operating throughout Malta and stop at university, thanks to Mater Dei Hospital. On the other hand, De Battista argued that the problems would increase when Mater Dei Hospital is fully functional since the direct buses will be used by people visiting the hospital, which can be an inconvenience to those students who choose the public transport to get to university.