Carpool

Carpools in general are a smart and sustainable way to navigate a city like Los Angeles. According to www.go511.com, over 700 miles of carpool lanes exist on Southern California freeways, and sharing the ride is always better than individuals driving alone.

While the USC Transportation carpool program embraces all aspects of carpooling, our goal is straightforward: to reduce the number of single-occupancy vehicles that come to our campuses. To do so, we incentivize carpoolers with lower parking rates and additional benefits like free parking passes. To further that goal, the rules of the program have been updated and clarified, below. Please make sure you and your passenger(s) meet all the requirements below before applying!

Carpool Requirements:

  1. All members of the carpool must be USC constituents (employees or students) with their own unique ten-digit USCID number. The application form itself is shibboleth-protected, and you will have to use USC’s 2FA to access the form.
  2. All members of the carpool must have different vehicles registered in their USC Transportation accounts. If your passenger does not have their own vehicle, the primary goal of the carpooling program cannot be achieved (to reduce the number of single-passenger vehicles coming to campus). Giving someone without their own vehicle a ride to campus, while a great thing to do, will no longer qualify as a carpool for the purposes of this reduced-rate permit program. An employee dropping off a child to a USC daycare facility does not qualify as a carpool for the purposes of this reduced-rate permit program.
  3. All members of the carpool must live at least two miles from the campus or work center to which they are commuting. If you live in the North University Park area at UPC, or in a close radius to the HSC campus, you do not qualify as a carpool for the purposes of this reduced-rate permit program. Participants can live together (roommates, partners, etc.), but they must each have different vehicles registered in their USC Transportation accounts.
  4. No members of the carpool can have an alternate USC Transportation or Keck Parking and Transportation issued vehicle permit. Again, our goal is strictly to reduce the number of single-occupancy vehicles that come to our campuses; this should be the only permit you and your carpool partner(s) have. Passengers (only) will each be issued (3) free parking passes/month for use on those occasions when they must use a personal vehicle instead of the carpool, but they cannot have a separate permit of their own. The primary driver of the carpool is issued the permit itself.

Carpool Benefits:

  1. In addition to saving gas, sharing costs, less vehicle wear and tear, etc., the primary benefit of our program is a lower permit rate. For facilities that are normally in the Gold pricing tier, the carpool rate is set to the lower, Cardinal tier price. For facilities in the Cardinal pricing tier, the carpool rate is even further discounted. Due to the shortage of parking inventory at HSC, qualifying carpools at that campus are issued permits free of charge. Please refer to our Parking Rates page for exact pricing.
  2. As mentioned above, passengers get (3) free parking passes/month to use whenever they want (including USC home football game days). Specific guidelines on how/where passengers can redeem these free passes will be emailed to passengers once the carpool application is reviewed and approved. Please email USC Transportation’s Rideshare Coordinator at tsubsidy@usc.edu to confirm you have passes loaded to your account before trying to redeem them.
  3. Many of our parking structures have priority carpool parking areas on lower levels and/or near elevators. While carpool permits can be used in any normal, non-reserved space in their assigned structure, these priority areas are just one more way we try to incentivize folks to start riding to campus together.

FAQs

Still have questions? Please read our Carpool Frequently Asked Questions document. If you still can’t find the answer you’re looking for, please email USC Transportation’s Rideshare Coordinator at tsubsidy@usc.edu.

Ready to apply?

If you meet all our criteria for a carpool (USC constituents, with their own vehicles, who live 2+ miles away, and do not have any other permits) and you’re ready to apply, please be sure to have a scanned image of all participants’ Driver’s Licenses available, and then click here to complete the online application form. PLEASE NOTE: You have to be using your “@usc.edu” email address when you log into your computer/use 2FA in order to use the form. If your email/login has an extension like @law, @med, etc., the form will not work. You will typically be notified via email within 5-7 working days if you have been approved for the reduced-rate carpool permit program or not.