Crowded out in handicapped-parking space (newsarticle by me)

The Virginian Pilot - Commentary
Crowded out in handicapped-parking space
BY IVY KENNEDY

5/7/06

So you’re out shopping at the mall and at the last stop of the day. The parking lot, the size of a football stadium, is full; all but a few empty disabled parking spaces. They are so close to the store, it’d really save your aching feet. You won’t be there for long anyway. Who’s it going to hurt?



This is what I imagine people are saying to themselves when I can find only one measly disabled parking spot. Most shopping centers have more than enough, so it boggles my mind when all of them are taken. Could all of these people possibly be disabled or elderly?




Then I finally nab a spot. I glance over and watch as somebody zips into the disabled parking space next to me. The person quickly hops out of his car and rushes into the store as if a fire were lit underneath them. But not before making sure the disabled parking tag is out of the glove box and securely hanging on the rear-view mirror.


I sit there dumbfounded. How did this person come to possess one of these tags? I have cerebral palsy and use a power wheelchair. And this is the one of many obstacles I face every time I venture out. It’s a type of annoyance that can slowly pick at you until you are having a “Falling Down” daydream. You know, that movie where Michael Douglas has a breakdown after he missed breakfast at McDonald’s by five minutes.


The family and friends I go out with seem more frustrated about it than I am. I’ve just learned to control my feelings. Who am I to think that I’ll change people’s justification with my “Stupidity is not a disability, park elsewhere!” bumper sticker?


Then comes the anxiety of dealing with the poorly laid out hash marks, which are supposed to allot me enough room to get out of my van. In most cases, they are only wide enough to lower my lift. I reach the ground and I find myself right up against the car parked beside me.


How am I expected to drive my power chair off my lift with two inches between my knees and a car door?


OK, so there’s disabled parking specifically set aside for vans that alleviates this problem. But the same debacle occurs; people who don’t need them have taken them. Or somebody who has every right to park in a disabled only spot insists on taking the van space when there’s another open disabled space nearby.


This situation happened to me one night at a restaurant. The car ahead of me swung into the van spot while I was left with the spot designed for somebody using a walker.


As I took the paint off the door of the car next to me trying to maneuver, he was helping grandma out of their car. Maybe I could talk to them and try to get at least one person to understand.


“Do you know you parked in the van space?”


“Yes, for my mother.”


“Yeah, I know you have a disabled tag, but this is the only spot wide enough for my chair.”


The man looked lost and left his car right where it was.


People just don’t understand. The average person living in Hampton Roads doesn’t have these problems. That’s probably why it continues with no end in sight.


I’ll just have to hold my head high and not let this one little thing get to me. But if you’re reading this, remember my view the next time you’re in a full parking lot.



• Ivy Kennedy is a member of the disability advocacy group at the Endependence Center and a volunteer for the disabled. More of her articles on coping with a disability are on her Web site www.geocities.com/ivykennedy

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