News

Anyone who has visited the Hill knows the difficulty of finding good parking. Between faculty, staff, students, and visitors, cars fill nearly every corner of campus. Finding ways to reliably transport people while saving space and energy is a significant consideration at St. Olaf College — and one of its solutions has emerged in the form of staff and faculty carpool groups. While the college has facilitated parking and group formation, most of the initiative for this system has come from eager faculty and staff. These groups have not only decreased the number of cars on campus, but have also helped coworkers form connections and learn about different perspectives across the college. 

Several carpool groups operate on campus, consisting of staff and faculty from various departments. Some primarily include coworkers, like in the world language departments or the library resources or admissions offices. Others unite members from a range of departments and positions. Most groups have been active since the initiative started in 2023, and some even predate it. The college has supported these efforts by establishing priority parking carpool spots in several lots and sharing sign-up information through newsletters and bulletin boards. 

From a professional standpoint, carpool groups have proven to be valuable spaces for all sorts of work-related discussions. Taking the same car means that coworkers arrive and depart at the same time. “I think it makes us more pleasant for our families, because we get out our angst in the car if we had a bad day,” says Associate Professor of French Livi Yoshioka-Maxwell.

Members often use their travel time to debrief, plan, and strategize for the week ahead. 

“I often do actual work in the car,” says Yoshioka-Maxwell. “We work through agendas, and we go over business stuff together quickly and efficiently.”

On an inter-departmental level, forming a carpool group provides an opportunity to connect with faculty and staff members that usually do not interact. Yoshioka-Maxwell elaborated: 

“I think there’s a lot of siloing between staff and faculty in ways that are not helpful for the cohesion of the community as a whole, so I think it is a really nice opportunity to meet other people and hear about their perspectives on what’s important about working here.”

Director of Disability and Access Laura Knobel-Piehl ‘93 says carpooling has given her new insight into faculty duties at St. Olaf. 

“I know a lot about how things affect students and how things affect staff, but I don’t really interact with faculty as much, and so that’s been really fascinating for me,” she says. “Just learning about what things are like in the life of a faculty member as far as how they became professors, and the other things they do like advising and doing recommendation letters for fellowships — these are all things that you don’t necessarily know unless you’re in that world.”

Sarah Quimby, head of acquisitions and resource management at Rolvaag Memorial Library, was among the first group to sign up for priority parking. She enjoys the social aspect of the groups and the positive environmental impact, but she also highlighted the economic benefits of forming a carpool group:

“I drive down four or five days a week, so it’s super nice if somebody else will share the driving, and I don’t have to fill up my gas tank every week,” she says. “It’s just a benefit all the way around.”

Beyond professional connection, many campus carpool groups have been a great place to form friendships. In the car, members create playlists to share music tastes, or listen to podcasts together. They will often update the others on their personal lives, invite them over for dinner, get to know each other’s families, or pet sit. Carpooling can also bring neighbors closer together, as proximity is a key factor in group formation. Yoshioka-Maxwell, for example, started carpooling with Associate Professor of Classics Kyle Helms after she moved to the neighborhood a block away from him. 

“We had actually never spoken before, but we live almost an hour away from campus, so it was a really good idea,” Yoshioka-Maxwell says. “It was nice because I didn’t meet very many people outside of my department for years, actually, because of the pandemic.” 

For most, the environmental aspect of carpooling was very appealing, and a significant reason for joining a group. One of the motivators for starting carpool groups on campus was a presentation from a group of students in ENVST 237: Integration and Application Environmental Studies, about their semester Academic Civic Engagement (ACE) project. The students set out to measure Scope III gas emissions at St. Olaf, which are associated emissions generated off campus, including from car and air travel for commuting and study abroad. The students calculated that St. Olaf faculty and staff drove a total of 30,101 miles in 2022, used 195,622 gallons of gas, and generated about 1,700 tons of CO2. Yoshioka-Maxwell, who served as a sustainability committee member, was curious about what the college could do to reduce emissions.

“I thought it was interesting because all of [the students’] models excluded carpooling as a factor, which made me wonder if there was a carpooling initiative that existed here, and how much that could really reduce the carbon footprint,” she says.

There are several factors that contribute to a successful carpool group. Finding people to form a group with has been made much easier with the help of Sarah Lynnore’s ARC GIS Rideshare Map, which shows the number of employees in each zip code. Once established, members try to equally divide driving responsibilities. With hybrid work schedules becoming more common after the pandemic, groups also need to communicate and plan clearly who will be traveling where and when. Quimby’s group, for example, keeps a thorough calendar spreadsheet that ensures driving responsibilities are shared equally and schedule differences are accounted for. 

While many groups operate daily, others fluctuate seasonally — particularly in admissions, where travel is frequent. 

A common concern in joining a carpool group is that other members will have to wait around while each person finishes their work, but Yoshioka-Maxwell says that this hasn’t been a problem: 

“If you’re committed to the carpool, you’ll make it work, especially because [waiting for] 10 minutes isn’t very much when the drive down here takes almost an hour,” she says. “Sometimes it’s good, because it makes you go home instead of staying here until 7 p.m. working.” 

Knobel-Piehl had a similar concern before joining a group. 

“One thing I was worried about was that if I were in a carpool I would be stuck to almost like a bus schedule,” she admits. “But we’ve come up with a really good way of putting on the calendar a range of time that we would need to leave by, and anyone who could fit into that range will chime in on a group text.”

The college is hopeful that carpooling groups will continue to grow on campus, especially with the incentive of priority parking spots.

“[The priority parking spots] are great,” Yoshioka-Maxwell says. “It can save five or 10 minutes. But you have to get here early if you want the really good ones.”

There are currently forms posted around campus to join or form carpooling groups, and groups with openings are eager to find participants. Although it seems like a small thing, for many staff and faculty members, carpooling is a positive and useful system that makes the commute to and from campus easier. As Quimby puts it:

“Carpooling is great. It makes working here possible.”