Students at a leading university are being forced to leave notes on their car windscreens begging clampers not to clamp them as they can't find anywhere to park despite having paid €40 for an on-campus parking permit
Maynooth University has employed German clamping company Apcoa to patrol the car parks on its campus but angry students union bosses claim that they are being forced to abandon their vehicles in the first available area as there are not enough spaces to meet the need.
An additional car park area is under construction but is weeks from completion.
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Now 2,000 angry students have signed a petition complaining about the situation.
Students Union Vice President Lucas Jeanniot revealed, "This morning, (Tuesday), one student was forced to work from her car for two hours as she just could not find a parking space on campus.
"Students are missing lectures or just managing to catch the end of them because of this issue, we suspect the college has issued more permits than there are spaces but when we asked them about that we never got a reply.
"It has come to the point where we have to leave notes on our cars pleading for Apcoa not to clamp us, and as you can imagine those pleas are routinely ignored.
"We had one poor girl come to the union office in tears as she had just been clamped for the second time in as many days, she had to pay an €80 release fee both times.
"And that is another issue Apcoa won't release the clamp until you pay the fee and students have been left to wait over two hours before someone comes to release them.
"This has been going on for weeks but it's come to a head recently because the numbers being clamped is going up.
"We are not asking for much but surely the sensible course of action is for the University to suspend clamping on any car displaying a valid permit until they finish off the new car park and provide enough spaces for everybody."
In a statement the University said, "We monitor the use of parking spaces on a daily basis and while we accept that parking may not be available at all times where drivers wish to park our surveys have found approximately 200 spaces are available in an overflow car park at any given time.
"We are currently building a new car park on campus which is due for completion in the coming weeks."
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