Idiots in parking services

I'd not mentioned this before, but the company I work for is fixing its parking garage. This means 80 carpools have had to relocate to one of several locations up to 7 blocks away from the building. I thought I'd heard there were 300 carpools so the odds were that any one carpool would not get chosen. Lucky us. The union picked the carpools (not that I trust them an inch) and sure enough, we hear that union leader carpools that got picked "some how" are now back in the building. Could be a vicious rumor, but I find it telling that everyone (and I mean everyone) is quick to believe it.

The transition from company garage to the relocation sites has been poorly run since the beginning: no instructions of how to enter the garages, not enough passes for all carpool drivers, delays in responses to questions, and NO PLANNED ROTATION. If your carpool was picked to leave the building during construction, then your carpool stays out of the building for the FULL YEAR that construction will take.

There are approximately 20 company carpools in the garage I'm assigned to. The company has a "contrator" agreement and we have stickers for the cars that indicate we're contractors using the garage which is located under a college building. Other than the hike at night up to the garage can be interesting (and you don't want interesting) there have been no problems. Until last Thursday: Christmas Eve.

My company was kind enough to let us go early and I was at the garage just after Noon. Could I get in? Treat that as a rhetorical question. Of course not! The college is on winter break and the building was totally locked! With all the tall buildings my cell phone couldn't get a signal and who would I call anyway especially with the school closed? Fortunately (praise God!) a campus police office came by within a few minutes and let me in after I explained how I happened to not be a student or faculty and have my car locked in their garage. He escorted me to my car.

Once I got home I emailed the coordinators of this parking fiasco wanting to know how am I supposed to get to my car on Monday evening when it's dark, school is out of session and the building is locked down. Much later that night I got a read-receipt from the head coordinator.

Public parking garages are $18 a day. Non realistic and cost prohibitive for A YEAR. I'm hoping against logical hope that I'll have a resolution email before I go to bed tonight. I won't go to work tomorrow without knowing their plan for me to get my car daily. If I need to call the campus police every day that school is out to gain access to the building, I will. And what will happen at Spring Break and Summer Break?

My Plan B hope is that I get a response tomorrow (Monday) to my email detailing the expected procedure if/when this happens again. On Tuesday I'll drive to work, park in the garage (entry is not a problem) and see what happens in the evening. "Hello? Campus Police? I have a problem."

GRRRRR. I work with idiots.

I Know Nobody Asked Me But...opening statement

I needed a place to speak my mind freely on all sorts of topics. These will probably be more of pet peeves and small annoyances. I do not seek to rile up the masses! This is my spot for my views. If you vehemently disagree with anything I'll have to say, may I politely suggest you get your own blog for your own views.