To think it takes a special kind of arsehole to fuck up wheelchair access?

[CatThiefKeith]

Apologies in advance for the rant, but I've had a particularly bad couple of days with arsehole parkers.

Yesterday I took a lady who has a history of strokes and heart attacks to hospital, where she got some fairly bad news. Our local hospitals disabled bays have one yellow box between every two spaces, and you drive or reverse in, depending which side the wheelchair user needs to get out.

Got back to the car with a very emotional lady to find some Arsehat had parked right over the box on my passenger side, leaving a 4ft gap next to his car where there was no box. Had to leave lady halfway down the car park, pull my car out with the hazards on, get her, get her in, reverse back into my space, then take the wheelchair back to customer services. Wanker.

And now today have taken a different lady to a mobility aids clinic and some utter twat has used the dropped kerb/wheelchair access as a fucking parking space. Both of these fuckers had a blue badge themselves btw.

To top it all off this afternoon took my favourite sweary nonagenarian for afternoon tea in the village and 3 fuckwits had parked over drop kerbs or across pavements. Tossers.

I think all new drivers should have to volunteer to take wheelchair users out and about before getting their license, just so they can see what a monumental pain in the arse it is when ramps are blocked. AIBU?

Pavement parking is a massive issue for people with many types of disability as well as for those pushing pushchairs. It basically forces some of the most vulnerable people in society to walk in the road which if you can't see the traffic, or hear it, or move out the way quickly is a huge risk.

There's been a campaign going on for a few years to try to make it illegal. Perhaps some of you would be kind enough to sign the petition to support this campaign? It's here

I had a visit from the Council yesterday to give me a shiny new badge and tell me they'd painted my lovely, much-anticipated, new personalised disabled bay so I can now park safely and with enough space to get my wheelchair in and out of the boot with the hoist.

So yesterday afternoon, DS and I went out to retrieve the car from where it was previously parked and ceremonially parked in the new space, relieved that seven months of anxiety over parking were finally at an end.

It took all of 30 minutes before I glanced out the window and saw some twat had parked on the double-yellow-keep-clear-in-front-of-the-gates space behind me... and into 5 feet of my space right the way up to my bumper. In the bay they made long enough that I shouldn't have to worry ever again about not having space to use the wheelchair hoist

I don't doubt I will have a parking thread up within days but would it really kill people to be more considerate? I'm sure this guy would have been all 'oh, I was only going to be a few minutes', too.

You have my sympathy, OP - YANBU

Today being bin day and school holidays means that I will spend most of the time out walking with ds plus wheelchair in the road as the pavement will be full of bins and people blocking most of pavement with their cars.

Zacky I also need to be able to access pavements clear and safe to take out my 3dc who have autism and other disabilities. They are at way to much risk to walk onto the road, they could be killed, and things like a busy pavement with people squeezing round parked cars mean they might brush up against them and cause the kind of melt downs that require an ambulance and sedation, after they have bashed their heads off the ground, broken my nose for the nth time etc. Same for toilets, they need disabled access toilet to stay away from hand dryers, youngest can't bear the feel of ear defenders so not an option, and is still in nappies so needs her dignity respected. I also need a hand rail to help me up and down and have Contin ace problems that effect waiting for other toilets if busy. You can't see any of this but doesn't make it any less disabling.

I just signed the petition witwoo, thanks. My DS is in a wheelchair & we routinely experience problems like those described above. We have frequently been put in situations where we are & forced to walk out in the middle of the road because of this.

Pavement parkers and abusers of wheelchair parking spaces are (some of) the banes of our lives under the heading 'thoughtless selfish scumbags'.

& octopus it's not just physical disabilities either, try have 20 odd voices shouting in your head every moment of the day while you try to navigate basic tasks. Or severe panic attacks. Or agriphobia. Or DID. Or ptsd.

Whilst ya obviously nbu, I do hate those kinds of spaces that only have hatch on the one side.

We need to be able to drive forwards into a space to get my chair out of the boot, as we have a long-ish car and can't leave the nose hanging four foot out of the end of the box (nor can we trust people not to park too close if they are back to back spaces) which leaves us with half of the small amount of spaces already!! Plus the hatch on one side assumes that only one person in the car is disabled, what then happens when there is more than one?!

Disabled facilities really need more thought. It should be compulsory for anyone designing them to practise using them with various disabilities to make sure their provisions are adequate

Selfish parking seems to be the norm near where I work. Walking back from lunch the other day I met an upset and angry woman in a wheelchair who was stranded on the pavement outside our office building due to cars parked bumper to bumper including one right across the dropped kerb. A little while later a colleague noticed two police officers by the offending car - good we thought some action being taken about this twatish parking. How wrong we were, turned out it was the driver who had called the police as wheelchair user had written a message in lipstick on the passenger window of the car. Don't know what if anything was said to the driver but she received a warning about criminal damage!

for you OP, for kindnesskindness and help to others

Regarding toilets, if you can walk you do usually have more options. Having spent time with inflammatory bowel disease sufferers like crohns and colitis (including ds) sometimes you really need space to clean yourself up, empty your stoma bag, make a load of embarrassing noises. You may look normal and able bodied but really need a disabled loo.

It really pees me off the way some blue badge holders regard their badge as a right to do whatever they like even when it is actively DANGEROUS to other road users! There is one who frequently (ie almost daily) parks on double yellows, partly on pavement, on a bend in the road and has several times almost caused an accident. By parking just a couple of yards further up they would still be on double yellows but comparatively safely so (i.e. almost on top of a crossing). And no - it's not a hospital appointment - it is outside a pub where I assume that they are having a coffee/pint and a good old natter! (Car is there for hours)

I have nothing against anyone having a social life of their choosing, but not when it endangers other people. This particular driver forces pedestrians with buggies etc into the road, and also prevents other drivers from having a decent view of what's ahead.

Just because you have a blue badge, it doesn't mean you can do what you like!

it was the driver who had called the police as wheelchair user had written a message in lipstick on the passenger window

!!!!!!!!!!

Just unbelievable!

Until I took this job I had never really understood how much thoughtless parking impacts people with disabilities.

I'm serious about it being part of the driving test.

One lady I support lives in a lovely adapted flat, but can rarely get off her little estate because of a dickhead that parks across the drop kerb by the exit most days. There isn't another on that side of the (very busy) Road.

As others have said I think a lot of this is thoughtless behaviour because people just do not realise how hard it is to deal with wheelchair access. This is not excusing because people should be observing things like parking restrictions,dropped kerbs etc, but I doubt that it is being done maliciously (not that it helps the immediate situation) .

Many years ago my terminally ill brother was a wheelchair user at the end of his life and I think we all had a dramatic revelation of the difficulties in using a wheelchair . It makes you look at so many things differently, street layout, road access, parking, door design, toilet availability , the width of aisles in shops, how boring parks are if you have to stick to the paths, dog mess, potholes, uneven pavements......

I can't stand it when people park across drop kerbs OP. My heart sinks whenever I realise there is no accessible drop kerb anywhere, it is a real struggle for me to get DS wheelchair off the kerb without one and sometimes if the kerb is too high, I can't do this at all. This has put DS at real risk on plenty of occasions.

It is really depressing…..we live in a small road, everyone knows about DS & he is not the only wheelchair-bound person in the road; yet the number of people who park up on the pavement, leave dustbins & other items there, park across blocked kerbs. And occasionally park their cars in our dedicated disabled bay outside our house or allow their visitors to do so 'only for a moment' when they can see for themselves what is involved in transferring DS to & from the house.

This thread is really depressing about how knobby people are.

I am very lucky to not need a blue badge but have taken my Gran (aged 90+ with only 1 functioning leg & 1 functioning arm) to shops/hospital/church etc on many occasions & have had to park her in the middle of the road to get the car out (with it's blue badge). She blew away just before Xmas which was awful & only for a lovely man passing by she would have been seriously hurt, but I was in the car.

In her hey-day when she could still drive (but needed a zimmer frame & adapted car), some tit parked a Range Rover ACROSS the back of her car in the disabled space at Tesco as they figured "if she was proper disabled she'd take ages & they'd only be 5 minutes". She reversed back & forth into the passenger side of their car trying to get out until they came back. Bloke came back roaring & shouting WTF had she done to his car & to their credit several people witnessed it & told him it bloody served him right. He called the police & got really aggressive towards her but thankfully a sensible bobby came out & arrested him for threatening behaviour AND parking like a dick

Dd is a wheelchair user and regularly has to go into the road or make long detours because of cars parked over dropped kerbs, dog mess, vomit or broken glass on the pavements, shop signs or bins left in the middle of the pavement.
It is not that it is deliberately done to make disabled people's lives more difficult, just that there is a total lack of thought about the impact of their actions on others.

When it is 'officialdom' at fault it is even worse. Dd had to make a 1/4 of a mile detour for weeks on her way to school while the LA were installing new traffic lights because they hadn't bothered to ensure that there were ramps at each part of the crossing.

And then there was the restaurant which installed a new 'disabled toilet' up a high step.

I think the police prosecuting the lipstick writing disabled person is truly shocking though.

many years ago now, but the school that DF taught at refurbished a department and put in a disabled toilet. It was only when DF went in to have a look (he was in charge of Learning Support) that the architect and builders realised that they'd left no room for an actual wheelchair to get in, never mind be turned round, and the person move to the loo .

DD2 is an occasional wheelchair user, and the number of times she's been parked outside the disabled loo, waiting for it to be empty, to be confronted by mum and small child who had "only popped in because the queue in the ladies was too long". DD is far too nice to point out that so is the queue for the disabled loo.

OTOH, she has a friend who has disabilities which don't require a disabled loo (she does know this for a fact), who insists on using them "because she's disabled, and they're there for her to use".

It's just like the disabled access toilets - "oh I was only a minute" every fucking single time.
I always find that one difficult. Common sense says dont use them unless youre disabled or theres a reason.
E.g. Friend of mine had just got over a sickness bug with the runs. She jumped up needinh the toilet badly, queue in the ladies so went to the disabled becasue it was better than pooping herself
Another friend has a tube that needs sorting for a medical condition, much easier in the disabled where she can get the stuff out etc.
Another friend is physically able bodied but has a gut problem and she has a card that dhe can show to cafes etc if she needs their facilities.
Male friend needed to change babys nappy but the changing facilities were in the womens. He took his stuff into disabled to change his daughter and clean her up.

To a physically disabled person they would think my friends were taking the piss but Id have thought those situations were reasonable reasons and if it held someone up for a couple of minutes, thats life. People queue for loos all the time.

Personally my own opinion but for those...
Sickness bug (short term) and queue - go to the front of the queue
Tube - fine
Digestive condition (long term) - fine
Babies nappy - do it on his lap?

Personal favourite bad design was an inward opening door. You could get a chair in and get on the toilet, but not if you wanted to close the door. Ffs!

I wouldnt want to have diahorea in a communal bathroom, least of all have to announce it to everyone as I queuejumped. How awkward and embarrassing.

Id not expect any parent to change a baby on their lap with a changing bag in a cubicle either. Often public loos dont have lids so its sitting clothes on a loo seat etc.
Places should have approprriate baby changing and if they dont then using the disabled is fine by me (plus in quite a few places near me the baby changing is now in disabled loos too so its not in gendered toilets - i hate the assumption that baby change goes in the womens loo)

God forbid anyone feel embarrassed for using a toilet for perfectly ordinary toilet functions. That's totally worth me pissing myself for, how selfish of me.

But they are close to shitting themselves.
Thats my point!

Rather than push past everyone announcing theurr going to poo themself, they can just go straight into the disabled and use that.

You say waiting a minute or 2 will mean yoy pissing yourself.
What would you do if there was a wheelchair user in the toilet? Or anmoyed that other people were waiting for disabled loos? Be annoyed you had to queue? Be pissed off at other people with needs because you have to wait?

My point (as others have made on here) is that some people on here seem to have an idea of what "counts" as a real disability.

A parent mentioned needing to take their child in becaude they have autism and the handdriers would cause a meltdown.
Yoy wouldnt know looking at the friend with dihorea or the friend with a gut condition which is which, yet youd be pissed off at them because they dont appear disabled enough to you.

You dont know just looking at somebody why they need to use a disabled toilet so getting pissed off because in your mind a situation isnt deserving is odd to me.

No, when someone comes out I don't know their situation. That isn't the same as you posting a situation on here though is it, cause then I know that they aren't disabled

I hope your babychanging-male friend and friend-with-an-upset-stomach are getting the EA amended to include them, considering you know best "what counts as a real disability"

I'm not pissed off at anyone based on what they look like, I'm pissed off based on you telling me they have the right to be there

Autism is a disability, I have no idea why you mentioned that in comparison?