Disability Sheffield and the Disability Hub together with the Access Liaison Group has put together a Response to the Transport Committee Pavement Parking Inquiry .
Working together we pulled together the experiences of disabled people in Sheffield. With over a hundred thousand disabled people in the city we wanted to highlight Pavement Parking as a seriously dangerous issue and were keen to align it to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (UNCRPD) by Article 9: Accessibility, which recommends that the state/country ‘’take appropriate measures to ensure persons with disabilities have access, on an equal basis with others, to the physical environment.‘’
It also gave us the chance to highlight the 12 pillars of independent living all of which need to be in place for disabled people to be fully included in society and have full choice and control over their lives. Number five on the list demands full access to the environment.
For wheelchair users, people with mobility impairments, blind people and those with sensory impairments having a car parked in your way can lead to bumps and bruises or, in certain situations, force people onto the road where their lives are endangered. Quite simply we said it made no sense to allow parking in this manner, especially when you consider the practice of Pavement Parking is outlawed in London.
Sheffield Royal Society for the Blind (SRSB) gave the following statement:
“Pavement parking is certainly an issue for our visually impaired clients. Sometimes, motorists may think they are being helpful by parking off the road, or sometimes it may be that they just don’t think at all. However, in either case, they may not realise the impact it can have on someone who has sight loss, as well as many other members of the community, such as wheelchair users, elderly people, or people with prams for example“.
James Martin – Deputy Chair Sheffield Access Liaison Group said, ‘as well as being able to highlight this dangerous issue for disabled people it also gives the council a chance to understand how this is meant to be enforced, how this can be reported by the public sufficiently for ‘remote’ officer enforcement. It also enabled us to highlight other linked issues such as bus clearways ‘.
We were pleased that Paul Blomfield, Member of Parliament for Sheffield Central made a submission because of the number of incidents of problem parking raised by his constituents in recent months. Paul said, ‘the major complaints are about the problem of vehicles parking partly on the pavement and causing an obstruction for pedestrians, guide dog owners, pushchairs and wheelchairs. Pavement users are forced to leave the pavement and use the public highway which poses obvious risks ‘.
05 Jun 2019 12:17:48
The Transport Committee has published a Sheffield response on inquiry exploring the problems of pavement parking in England. In summary disabled people’s organisations have put forward a number of possible solutions they would like considered as a means of ensuring the built environment is as accessible and as inclusive as possible for everyone. Watch this space for any further news relating to the enquiry, including potential for the UK to give its local councils the power is to outlaw parking on local pavements.
05 Jun 2019 14:25:40
Please copy and paste the following link into your search bar: http://data.parliament.uk/writtenevidence/committeeevidence.svc/evidencedocument/transport-committee/pavement-parking/written/101989.html and you can follow this link for the Council response https://sheffieldnewsroom.co.uk/news/pavement_parking/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=govdelivery