First off, get this, I've been lifting for a long time, so I've seen practically everything you can…read morethink of in gym size and quality from megaliths of fitness and cockiness, to the most quaint, and dirty of back-alley machine shops. UVA has a few different gyms, each with their benefits and weaknesses. This review pertains ONLY to the AFC, as it's known around these parts pardner. Yeehaw.
For a gym, the AFC has essentially everything you could need. A pool with separate sections, various levels of diving boards, a GIANT hot tub, a smaller pool for children, a sauna, a wide range of aerobic equipment, free weights, and weight machines. Really, it's more than you can ask for out of bigger gyms like Gold's, quite frequently I might add. At peak times (read: New Years for about two weeks), it can get pretty packed, but luckily the variety of gyms keeps the population reasonable most of the year, if not awesome when everyone's given up on getting healthy and the serious of us can STACK THOSE PLATES.
Really, only two complaints. First, this facility is INACCESSIBLE to anyone outside of UVA. It's free for students, but memberships can only be purchased by alumni or current staff/faculty, no one else (with one exception, keep reading). If you want to get in, the price is reasonable, purchased per day, but you have to have someone associated with the gym to sponsor you. Otherwise, the only way to get in is to live with someone (ie marriage typically) so you can get your own pass. It will never happen, but one would think if UVA would open at least this facility to outside passes, perhaps charging more for people not associated with the university, they could make some serious cash off of it. However, it's understandable why they do it as they do, which brings us to the second problem.
Second, THE PARKING IS BEGIGGING AWFUL JESUS CHRIST. UVA is notorious for terrible parking, because they have this thing about not making room and keeping the original campus as-is in terms of original layout. Cool and all, but every time they make a new building guess what they do? GET RID OF MORE PARKING. If you want to go to the AFC, after 5PM when you don't have to pay is really the best time, unless you have a pass for a lot close by, which is doubtful unless you work at UVA or live near the AFC. The parking lot in front of it is PATHETIC and for the size of the gym a horrid joke. It holds about 20-30 cars maximum, and at peak hours at night, all those spaces are filled with cars of people typically playing basketball. WE HAVE PLATES TO STACK GET THE HELL OUT. During the day you can pay by the hour in spots in front, along the side, and near the stadium, and make sure you do because the attendant watches those spots like a hawk that hasn't eaten a single mouse in a month. POUNCE SWOOP CLAWS IN YOUR POCKET CASH GONE. So that's one thing that's strange about the AFC, just awful parking. They really need to figure something out. For how large it is, and considering it's the largest, most modern, and most inclusive gym at UVA (with the exception of lacking a bag room), it's hilarious how small the main parking area is.