We went to our local grocery store the other day and parked in a disabled spot. (I have a legally issued permit or “placard” as they call them in Florida). As we were getting out of the car, we saw two people who also had a placard that had no physical impairment park in a disabled spot. That begs the question, were they using their mom or dad’s placard to use that spot? I have even seen people park in these spots with no permit and keep on walking.
There are more permits given out in Florida than actual spaces available. These permits are given out so easily that once, an acquaintance of ours was given a permanent permit instead of a temporary one (he had a temporary injury that required him to utilize the parking spaces). Luckily, he was an  honest person and went back to his doctor to get the right permit issued. How many people would actually do that?Â
The other problem is that the police don’t take ticketing offenders seriously. When I lived in my apartment, I came home with my then boyfriend (who is now my husband) and there was no place for us to park. When I called the police because there was someone parked in the disabled parking spot with out a placard, they pretty much laughed at me because I asked them to send someone out to ticket the person. It is no wonder people often take advantage of using disabled parking spots when they don’t really have permission to park there.  Nothing seems to happen to them anyhow.
Would there be better adherence to parking in disabled spots if fines were actually given out? Do people realize that there is a difference between a permanent placard and a temporary one?Â
Thanks for reading…
cr
I agree that Disabled Parking is over-issued in Florida. We should also be aware that not all disabling conditions can be observed. Many physical disabilities can be severe, but not necessarily obvious.
While this is true, I believe that people should be responsible enough to post the placard as required. That being said, I do also realize that it is possible to forget to post the placard once in a wile because, well, this is not a perfect world, and that is okay. It is very easy to make the placard visible so that people don’t just assume that you should not be parked in that spot at all. Being more vigilant in posting the placard would avoid a lot of frustration for people who need the spot. In the case of someone who does have a placard and ends up getting a ticket for not posting the placard, it would avoid them the frustration of having to rectify the fact that they were wrongly given a ticket in the first place. All in all, since there is a disporportionality, you would hope that people would be more mindful when utilizing the spots. Thanks for your post!
cr