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Getting them in and out

City leaders should study seriously whether parking is the best use of idle coliseum property.

Sure, traffic problems at recent well-attended sporting events cry out for a solution. One fix is to make sure police officers on traffic duty know what they're doing.

Creating more parking on site -- using part of the former Canada Dry property, for example -- is questionable. A more productive plan should be developed for that land.

Options should be explored, including leasing satellite parking areas and running shuttle buses for a charge equivalent to a parking fee. Customers could be dropped off and picked up mere feet from entrances and wouldn't have to waste time in traffic jams.

This is a good problem for the coliseum because it means capacity crowds attend many events. It just needs a good solution.

Top values in higher education

The UNC system is well-represented in Kiplinger's annual report of best value in public higher education. First on the list, for the 10th year in a row, is UNC-Chapel Hill. Also earning notice for 2011 were N.C. State, UNC-Wilmington, Appalachian State, the School of the Arts and UNC-Asheville.

Not bad considering the financial challenges lately. It's a credit to the leaders and faculty of these institutions that they can maintain academic quality at relatively low cost for students. That task won't get easier, but making affordable higher education available to North Carolina residents will help lead this state to a brighter economic future.

Tough Luck in Charlotte

As if the sting of a 2-14 season wasn't bad enough, the Carolina Panthers also have found out they'd lost out on the consolation prize they'd been expecting for all those defeats.

The team with the worst record in the National Football League gets the top pick in the next crop of college talent.

The Panthers had announced they would choose the star quarterback at Stanford, Andrew Luck, who was widely presumed to be leaving school for a professional career after his sophomore year.

No such Luck.

The young man has decided instead to remain in school and get his degree in architectural engineering -- even though he could lose millions by waiting. The NFL is poised to impose a cap for rookie salaries as part of its next collective bargaining agreement.

Luck's father told The Charlotte Observer that the Panthers shouldn't take this personally. His son "just wanted to stay where he was comfortable, go to college and ultimately win a Pac-10 championship."

It certainly feels better believing Luck was following his heart by staying in school to finish his degree -- as star athletes such as Kyle Singler at Duke and Tyler Hansbrough at Carolina have done before him.

And not that he saw a train wreck awaiting him in Charlotte and wanted no part of it.

Elon's choice

Elon University won't be placing its new physician assistant program in downtown Greensboro after all.

It would have been a nice addition, especially in light of UNCG's rebuffed attempt to start a school of pharmacy, also possibly downtown.

But that's OK. The PA program will begin in a renovated building on the campus in Elon. And it will train students for a field that pays well and is in very high demand.

Meanwhile, downtown Greensboro should emerge a winner anyway. Elon is shopping for land to expand its law school, which has been a resounding success in the center city.

A healthy prognosis all around.