...just wanted to see what others opinion is to this - maybe I'm being too sensitive???
Anybody want my opinion about people who have handicapped signs and placards who move around better then I do?
I didn’t think so.
Liberals
The system is abused. Lazy healthy people should be hobbled for using HP, and slightly less than healthy people should get slightly more convenient parking and have some pride in themselves. Truly needy people should get what they need to get by, not be elevated to royalty.
I love this public humiliation: (go to the one minute mark)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jJUo4JbM6LI
For the most part, the “Disabled” have long ago worn out their welcome in my heart.
“If you build it, they will come.” Indeed.
I think that the reason that people feel fine with violating these parking spots is that in some states, the number of handicapped parking spots is disproportionately huge compared to the number of people eligible to use them. When so many sit empty nearly all the time, one should question their existance in such great quantity.
There’s also the issue of people having the handicapped parking sticker/tag that aren’t handicapped. I drove through Rhea county in Tennessee the other day. It seems that half (and I’m not kidding, half) of the vehicles on US 27 had the handicapped parking tag or plate on their vehicle. Either people in that area are extremely disadvantaged or the elected officials like to give them out as favors.
That said, I don’t violate them. I can walk across the parking lot to get to the store when I go.
Since you asked, (and I do not mean this malliciously), I think you may be too sensitive to the issue, but you have been made this way by the existance of the reserved handicapped parking spaces.
Before such legislated parking spaces, I imagine the handicapped had great difficulty in parking, long distances to travel, and even longer if forced to park far away to have space for wheelchair access.
Now, you greatly benefit from what is mostly assured easy access. This can make you resentful when you do not get it. It is human nature.
It is a benefit paid for, however, by the fact that most others are prohibited from using convenient parking. Honest and thoughtful people will gladly pay this small price, but the world is full of a$$holes and it seems we all must endure them.
I unloaded all of this blather on you, just because your question did make me think. It seems that your feelings and the behavior of the violators are simply more of the unintended consequences we seem to always see from feel-good legislation, even something as innocuous as handicapped parking.
With smart phones and small video cams and Youtube, you can stop this bs quickly.
Take videos of the wrong doers and put them on YouTube. Then send an email to your local fishwrap explaining what is happening. Then notify the local leo’s what is happening and how to get to the YouTube link.
The rectums doing this are probaby driving luxury cars and are big donors to that school and the church. So those in charge are afraid to step up and do what is right.
Every day I see people with handicapped plates park in handicapped spots, jump out of the car and run into the store.
The worst problem down here near the border is the cars with Mexico license plates. The police often will not even ticket them because it is not worth the cost to try to get them to pay the ticket. Unfortunately most of the Mexican drivers know this and just ignore the traffic/parking laws.
If someone is parked illegally, then, I understand your frustration. My problem is that here in California the regulations for Disabled Parking has created a situation in which there are way too many Disabled Parking spots, most of which are never utilized. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gone to any one of a dozen businesses, especially during the Christmas season, and am unable to find a parking spot for 20 minutes or longer, despite there typically being more than a dozen Disabled spots unused.
At the university, I know one student who illegally uses a handicap permit. I reported him one time since he was more than able body to walk. The permit is for his mother who is a Disabled Vet (DAV plate). Afterward, I didn’t see him park in a handicap space but he started to do it again. Next e-mail goes to several of the high level people.
Let air out of 2 tires. Most people have a spare tire, hardly anybody has 2 spare tires.
Drawback is, the car will sit longer illegally in a disabled designated spot.
In the mid 80s while living in Prescott, Az, I noticed a pick-up
with a utility bed and a ladder strapped to the top. The sign
on the drivers side door stated that the vehicle belonged to
a plumbing company. I noticed that the license plate had the
wheelchair logo on it and I was instantly pissed off. I wondered
what kind of a debilitation a person could have and still be a
professional plumber. Later it occurred to me that the plumber
might have had a handicapped family member.
Too many spots, too many stickers, and too much abuse has rendered the system worthless. Its become parking-spot welfare ... where the abuse by the many entitled far outweigh the benefit to the few truly needy. Two days ago ... I saw an H2 with a handicapped sticker parked across two spots. If you can get in and out of an H2, you don’t need a sticker.
These days, its more about revenue than about the handicapped anyway. I think they should do away with them altogether.
SnakeDoc
Abuse of handicapped spaces and license plates had desensized a lot of people to illegal parking in those spaces. It sounds to me like you case is legitimate, but a lot of folks seem to get them because they are too lard-assed to walk fifty feet to an entrance.
I would never park in a handicapped spot illegally because I find inconvenience trivial, and the idea of depriving a truly handicapped person of the spot beyond odiuous.
I know someone who contracted polio as a child and is paralyzed from the waist down. His advice for what to do with able-bodied people parking in handicapped spots: break both their kneecaps. If they want to be disabled, we should humor that request.
No, you are definitely not being too sensitive.
My dad is in a wheelchair (due to Parkinson’s disease) and once, when I took him to a physical therapy appointment, one of the handicapped spaces (of which there were too few anyway) was taken by a truck that looked like it was used by someone doing construction or painting perhaps. Since there was a construction company a few doors down, I walked in there and told the group of people that whoever is illegally parked in the handicapped spot had best move or pay a $250 fine because I was calling the police.
The truck was moved in a few minutes time.
I’d report that car to the police if I were you.