Students might want to reconsider using cars this fall because campus construction might cause parking spaces to dwindle.

Parking this fall is “going to be a horrendous problem,” said NIU Parking Committee Chairman Rob Bornhuetter.

Pat Hewitt, associate vice president of Business and Operations, said more than 100 percent of the permits for available parking spaces are sold each year because of students and faculty who commute, go on vacation or become sick. Permits are sold at about a two to one ratio, she said.

More than 10,000 parking permits are sold each year, said Parking Division Manager Helen Nodurft. Parking permits vary in price and color for different people and purposes.

“Students just won’t be able to get their favorite (parking space),” said Parking Division Chief Clerk LaRonda Thuestad.

Construction on Faraday II, beginning sometime this fall, and construction on the Martin Luther King Commons are two projects that will diminish parking space.

If parking becomes a problem, “we do make adjustments,” Thuestad said. Temporary gravel lots might be created to ease space problems.

However, Nodurft said no plans have been made yet to install gravel lots because no official date has been set for the construction at Faraday II.

Hewitt said new lots would only be made for emergency situations because they are usually done in the summer while there is less traffic on campus.

“Incoming students should decide whether or not they need it (a parking space) or not,” Hewitt said.

There are five campus areas that will lose parking space:

Most of the parking lot by the Wirtz Quadrangle.

The entire lot by the Faraday building construction (once started).

The first row of spaces north of the Chick Evan’s Field House lot because of construction on Lucinda Avenue.

Some spaces will be lost in the lot west of Founder’s Memorial Library because of the Martin Luther King Commons construction.

Parking services received about $310,000 from ticket fines and $425,000 from permit sales in fiscal year 1989-90. The money is used for building and repairing lots, maintenance and running the department, Nodurft said.