Parking in mother and child space

traceya89

does anyone know if you can park in a mother and child space with a disabled badge if there are no disabled spaces available?

Lum

Any restrictions supermarkets may impose on parking spaces are completely unenforceable.

This applies to disabled, parent+child and anything else they might come up with in the future. Yup, that's right, they can't even touch the able-bodied plonker in the enormous Range Rover who is taking up the last two disabled spaces by parking sideways.

At the very worst, you'll get a fake parking ticket in the post, which you should promptly ignore. See pretty much any thread in the parking tickets forum for more details. Only council-run spaces can result in valid fines.

SailorSam

Look at it the other way around, do you think it's fair that someone parked in 'your' disabled bay if all the mother and child places were full.

Ellejmorgan

You could also be preventing a disabled mum who doesn't have a blue badge from parking..not everyone who is disabled has a badge,
I don't because I need to get some help filling in the paperwork for my dla which affects the blue badge system..

Lum

Elle: Are you aware that you can apply for the blue badge separately from the DLA claim?

You do have to answer some annoying medical questions, as opposed to automatically qualifying, but it's nothing like the DLA form. It's well worth doing so you can have the badge in the meantime.

Depending on your situation, obtaining the badge this way may even mean you have a few more spoons left at the end of the day with which to complete the DLA form!


As for the comments about depriving mothers of the space. The way I see it is, every time you park in any parking space you are depriving others of the use of that parking space. If you genuinely need the wider space then I don't see any problem with taking one, it's what they're there for. A disabled mother with or without a blue badge could legitimately use a disabled space if one becomes available, and if all the wider spaces are taken up it doesn't really make any difference if the OP used a parent+child space or hung around until a disabled space became free.

Depending on how busy it is, lets not forget that able-bodied parents also have the option of using an end-space further towards the back of the car park if they still want the extra room for unloading pushchairs, the OP may well not have that luxury.

Riversong

If you have a child with you go ahead.

I struggle getting my children out of the car in regular size spaces due to them being of the age where they flail and tantrum so I appreciate being able to use the spaces and not have them taken up by old people and disabled people who don't have children/grandchildren with them.

Lum

And a wheelchair user who is unable to walk is basically prevented from accessing their car at all if they park in a regular sized space and someone parks next to them. Unless they have a carer with them to move the car, they would literally have to wait for the car next to them to move.

People who use other kind of mobility aids, such as walkers or in some cases even crutches, face the same problem.

In a worst case scenario, assuming you're able bodied, you could at least pull the car forward a couple of meters for loading.


If this sort of thing is a regular occurrence then really a word needs to be had with the management about the insufficient number of accessible spaces.

Riversong

I partly agree with you. If disabled people are needing to use mom and child spaces then more disabled places need to be installed

Lum

Glad we could agree on something

I suspect we could also agree that the root cause is likely people with no disabilities OR children taking up the disabled bays (as they're always closest) and displacing genuine disabled people into the parent+child bays. Problem is you can't actually tell if someone is disabled just by the presence or absence of a wheelchair, and even if you could, supermarkets have no power to enforce it anyway.

Seriously though, I'm aware of how much of a pain it is getting a child unloaded from a car to a pushchair, but you should try pretending you can't walk and doing a car to wheelchair transfer on your own, without assistance, one day. Afterwards it might annoy you a bit less when a wheelchair user ends up forced to use one of "your" bays.

shegirl

SailorSam wrote: »

Look at it the other way around, do you think it's fair that someone parked in 'your' disabled bay if all the mother and child places were full.

No,a parent doesn't have the same needs as a disabled person who has problems affecting their mobility,which being a parent doesn't.

The two are non comparable

Riversong

Lum wrote: »

Glad we could agree on something

I suspect we could also agree that the root cause is likely people with no disabilities OR children taking up the disabled bays (as they're always closest) and displacing genuine disabled people into the parent+child bays. Problem is you can't actually tell if someone is disabled just by the presence or absence of a wheelchair, and even if you could, supermarkets have no power to enforce it anyway.

Seriously though, I'm aware of how much of a pain it is getting a child unloaded from a car to a pushchair, but you should try pretending you can't walk and doing a car to wheelchair transfer on your own, without assistance, one day. Afterwards it might annoy you a bit less when a wheelchair user ends up forced to use one of "your" bays.

Yes that is very true. I have seen many a childless car take up the space. But like you said without knowing the person you would never know if/the nature of a disability.

I always have a parking attendant stare into my car when I pull up into a child space, they also monitor/help people in the disabled spaces.