When you live with an institution in your neighborhood, life can be irritating at times. Take this morning for example.

Our neighborhood has The Haverford School as an institutional neighbor. We have suffered through their construction project for the famous green building they are building. We have wondered throughout the process what was green about all the construction worker trucks and vehicles that we have had to endure?

Haverford School says they are a good neighbor, but does being a good neighbor mean we always are expected to absorb all of their overflow parking? First students, then construction workers, and once they leave, students again?

How is it that Haverford School always builds buildings but never on campus parking facilities?

A few years ago to deal with the abuse of parking on the 400 block of Old Lancaster Road (adjacent to the train tracks), Lower Merion Township made parking legal on only ONE side of the street. Yet today, in spite of many posted signs saying "No Parking Any Time", one of the construction workers decided to park his truck on the wrong side of the street.

Parking with regard to the Haverford School is a chronic problem, and our neighborhood actually felt sorry in the end for the construction workers because the school never provided them with parking.

Soon the new school year will be upon us. And then the students will be back. This past academic year they were at Our Mother of Good Counsel. Some students early on decided to park on Barrett Avenue even though the school said they couldn't. But once the students stopped parking there, they went accross Lancaster to Penn Street, Dayton Road, Miller Street, and Martin Ave. Some on San Marino on occasion. The people on those streets were in Haverford Township, and we felt for them because we know what it is like to lose all our own on street parking. We even heard from some of the HT residents that their commissioner even contacted the school....all to no avail. Is that right? Are institutions above us all? Is that why Haverford School will post on Buck and Panmure on occasion their own personalized/branded temporary no parking signs? Do they have a permit from Haverford Township to do that? Buck and Panmure are PUBLIC streets, right? So only Haverford Township should be able to post temporary no parking signs, right?

We would love to say that we have a terrific relationship with our institutional neighbor, but we just can't. And the issues are not just taking all our parking and treating us like a parking lot or a trash can, it's the volume of cars during the school year. The parents and nannies who drop off the kids are very inconsiderate drivers at times. They speed and blow right through stop signs. Half of the time they don't even see any pedestrians because they are multitasking while driving. It used to be just talking on the cell phones, but now, now they even text and drive.

We know our complaints are not unique. Ask any resident who lives near an institution and they will tell you of these ongoing issues. Neighbors of Balwin get our problems, as well as neighbors of Bryn Mawr Hospital (those who are left there, that is). So we're asking, which came first the chicken or the egg? Or, which came first, the neighborhood or the institution? In most cases it is the neighborhood which first appeared on the scene and the institutions followed.

Institutions serve our communities, but the people in small neighborhoods around these institutions must be valued and respected as well. Speaking of small neighborhoods, who has seen Bryn Mawr Hospitals ginormous garage? It is the largest, most hulking and ugly thing ever! Nothing breaks up the massiveness of it. And look around at where all the houses used to be on Old Lancaster...it's just more parking. Is there enough macadam and concrete yet? And when will the hospital make sure that Old Lancaster Road is repaired so the road surface is improved? Or are they too busy dealing with the pro life activists who have decided to block sidewalks with their demonstrations?