The first day of school was tiring as always. You’re exhausted, itching to get home, settle down, and chill out. You climb into your ride and lay your head back, dreaming of the shut-eye you can get now that the day is done. Except you realize you haven’t moved.

Ten minutes go by and you’re still trying to get into one of the stagnant traffic lines clogging the lane. Twenty minutes pass and you’re slowly inching along. Thirty minutes pass and you still haven’t made it to the stoplight. Forty-five minutes later and you have finally made it on to McNeil Drive, only to wait in rush hour traffic either direction. Bet you can’t wait to get that driver’s license now.

But if you drive yourself, you encounter your own sets of problems. In addition to the painstakingly long traffic lines, you’ll be reduced to one exit path from Maverick Way. You’ll have to practically force your way into a traffic line because a majority of student drivers lack general parking lot courtesy. If you have to back out you might as well pull out some homework or take a nap, because you’ll be there for a while. Once you’ve made it through the ruthless crowd of student drivers, you’ll be frustrated to find that even though the secondary exit has been closed for bus efficiency, the busses are making their way through your exit as well.

You may think it will improve after the first few days or so, but you’d be wrong. Three weeks into the school year and traffic is still an issue. Last week I went ahead and recorded some statistics. I was consistently out the door by 4:15 and the earliest I made it out of the parking lot was 4:45. Hardly any student drivers were willing to give up their space in line and let me in. Even fewer were actually zippering (alternating at every intersection, similar to a four way stop). A few students even cut around the lines on the wrong side of the lanes, forcing their way into the line and skipping over everyone else. Even busses are reluctant to let in students who had finally reached Maverick Way.

One easy solution would be to re-open the PAC-side exit (Maverick Way West). One lane to exit is not enough for the number of drivers exiting, especially with short stop-light lengths at the McNeil Drive intersection. It’s even harder to share it with busses, who are slow over speed bumps and out of intersections.The school could also place traffic officers or school officials at the intersections to regulate the flow more efficiently.

To deal with student drivers, why not place stop signs at exit intersections on Maverick Way? This would legally enforce zippering and allow everyone to exit consistently.

Until solutions like these are implemented, students should just be courteous. Remember that everyone else wants to get off campus, too. Be kind, wait in line, and let others go. Cutting people off, not letting anyone in, and shouting at other students from your car window just add to the problem and force all the rest of us to wait that much longer.