Parking is a seven-letter word at the Houston VA hospital

It’s amazing how a trip back to Beaumont from Houston, all of 90 miles or so, wears me out. Or maybe it was all the sitting around I did at the DeBakey Veterans Affairs Hospital this morning in Houston? Or maybe combine all that with the 15 minutes I spent finding a place to park at the VA hospital?

Well, one thing about it, you could never mistake going to the VA hospital with fun.

I would have never known that they added 160 parking spaces in February at the DeBakey hospital. But that’s what their press release says.

“We know parking at the DeBakey VA is a serious concern for Veterans seeking health care,” said Adam C. Walmus, the hospital’s director. “The current situation is unacceptable and we are taking immediate action to alleviate the problem.”

I tell you what Mr. Director, I don’t think the 160 extra spaces were a drop in the bucket at least when it came to my driving around trying to find a spot this morning and finally parking more or less perpendicular to the VA Regional Office which is a lot closer to Holcombe Avenue than is the hospital. What I am saying is it was a good hike. Great for someone whose major problems include feet pain from walking for extended periods of time. In other words, the situation is still unacceptable.

Now I am sure the hospital folks would say: “But we have free valet parking.” True but one would spend as much time waiting to pull your car up to the hospital entrance, not to mention the waiting time for your car to be retrieved, as it takes to park your vehicle out in that mess that’s known as visitor parking.

The VA plans to increase parking spaces by the summer by 500. But that and the spotty enforcement seems like plugging up a hole in a boat made of Swiss cheese. One of the main problems cited by the Houston VA is that, since parking is free for visitors, this has led to jacking spaces by those who work elsewhere in the Texas Medical Center. Those employees simply park and hop on a bus or ride a bike over to the other hospitals. The VA has had its police checking to see if some of those cars actually belong there but that just seems fruitless.

My solution is to shoot these scofflaws who steal parking spaces from America’s veterans! I guess that’s a little harsh but I don’t even know if the total 1,200 spaces they hope to add at DeBakey when they build by 2016 some kind of structure over one of the existing parking lots will do much good.

There must be some kind of solution to the problem other than merely reshuffle the existing spaces. The task is providing parking, not brain surgery. I realize that is an oversimplification, especially since the government is involved. You add the frustration that you get trying to park with the frustration you have sitting around for hours on end waiting on appointments plus the frustration when you have to deal on occasion with one of the asses who needs to be working in something other than in contact with the public and you got yourself a real s**t storm. Seriously, it is surprising you don’t hear about more violent episodes than you do at the nation’s VA hospitals. It’s not just Houston’s.

It seems like if the Department of Veterans Affairs are serious about wanting to provide the best care possible, they could start when you park your car. The approach that is being taken is just too little too late.