Last night I witnessed first hand the importance of the proper use of handicap spaces and the surrounding area. My wife and I attended the her 10th reunion for the Summerville High School class of 1996. The event was held at clubhouse of a local gated community in Summerville, SC. We were joined by some good friends from out of town at the event and had a pretty good time. The event itself was not worth the $40 per person in my opinion, but the girls wanted to go. I spent a good portion of the night talking with Paul. Paul is the husband of Noel one of my wife’s friends since high school. Paul and Noel were in town from Virginia where they now live. Paul has been bound to a wheel chair for many years as a result of a motorcycle accident that left him paralyzed from the chest down. We have grown closer to Paul and Noel in recent years for many reasons because they also have a young son who has had to battle some very complex medical issues. Our families have endured a lot of common scenarios in dealing with our sons’ health care. They are very knowledgeable about their son’s very unique diagnoses.
They have visited our home several times in the past and we try to have them over or go out with them when they are in the area. Paul can drive. My wife did not even know that cars and vans could be equipped like this until just a few years ago. Paul has a specially equipped van that he can travel with unassisted. He can open the right side sliding door and lower the ramp with a remote control. He then navigates his motorized chair into the van where he rolls right up to the driver’s controls. His chair locks into place and he is ready to go. The use of these features of his van is where the problem came in last night.
Last night Paul parked his van in a handicap spot with the right side facing one of those blue striped areas. You know the ones I am talking about. The are found right next to the handicap space with the diagonal lines that are painted the same color blue as the handicap symbol found painted on the pavement in the handicap space. The purpose of these diagonal lines are alert people not to park there to allow for specially equipped vans to lower their ramps and lifting systems. Paul parked and exited his van using this nice space as it was intended to be used.
After the reunion gathering, Paul, Noel, Sherry, and I were the last of our group of friends to depart. The four of us talked for the better part of an hour just outside the door of the clubhouse. We then proceeded towards our vehicles to find a cute little Honda Element parked about two feet away from the right side of Paul’s van. There was absolutely no way to get the ramp down. There was no way to get him positioned in front of the ramp even if it had come down. His vehicle was rendered useless by the position of the other vehicle. Now we considered for one short minute the possibility that one of use could stand in there and use the controls to move the van back far enough to clear the other vehicle. Noel tried that once in the past when facing a very similar situation. She ended up bending the Paul’s van and another car in the process. We also thought about putting the van in neutral and attempting to push it back far enough for Paul to get in but I was really the only one immediately available to push. The most logical option was to go back inside and ask the DJ to announce a description of the vehicle that needed to be moved from blocking access to a handicap equipped van. I gladly took on this duty and proceeding back into the building. I found that there was no one in there except the DJ who was packing up, some club staff, and a few stragglers from the reunion. I asked each of them if they drove a Honda Element. No one claimed the vehicle. The club staff offered to call a tow company and I gladly accepted. The remaining few of the reunion attendees were gathered outside the front door. I stopped by every single group of people standing around talking and asked if any of them owned a Honda Element. I did not find the owner of the Element, but I did get some very proud responses from some who wanted to make sure I and others knew they drove Hummers, Mercedes, or BMWs. Once I explained why I was asking, they quickly piped down. I am guessing that these overly proud folks were a little embarrassed about using this unfortunate circumstance to play the “mine is bigger than yours” game.
I went back out by Paul’s van where Sherry was waiting with Paul and Noel. I told them that I could not locate the owner of the vehicle and the staff was calling for a tow truck. A few minutes later the lights flashed on the car like someone was hitting the lock button on a remote. I immediately yelled out that who ever owned this vehicle should move it immediately because a tow truck was being called to haul to off. No one responded and the few groups of remaining folks just stood a looked at us like were crazy.
A few minutes later a couple of the clubhouse staff members came out. One of them said that none of the towing companies would respond to this situation because they had no one to pay for the tow. The staff then called the North Charleston Police to see if they could help. The police arrived a few minutes later. They proceeded to inform us that there was nothing that they could do. The officer said that since this was private property they could only leave a situation on the car for $25 for illegal parking, and they had no authority to order a tow truck to move it. The officer said that he could write the owner a $200 ticket if they could be located. We were stunned. I asked the officer what Paul was supposed to do if the owner could not be located. He just shrugged and walked back to his car to run the tag number. He was going to see if they could locate the owner and that was about all he could do.
Here we were a good ten miles from Paul and Noel’s hotel with no way to transport him and his chair (about 600 lbs) and nothing that could be done to help us if the owner could not be located. We could have paid for a tow truck to move Paul’s van or the other vehicle, but how is fair for one of use to pay to get Paul out of this situation?
It was about this time that a second police car arrived. Then the lights flashed on the Element again. Then we saw a woman walking in our direction from the front of the clubhouse. We asked if she owned this vehicle and she confirmed that she did. We told her that the nice officer would like to speak with her. He asked here to first move her vehicle and she did so. The officer then came over and asked if we wanted him to cite her with the $200 ticket. I told Paul that I would appear in court as a witness, but it was up to him as to whether to pursue the charges. The woman told the officer that it was raining very hard when she arrived at the clubhouse and that she did not realize it was a “no parking” area. It had been raining hard earlier, and there was not a sign in front of the space. There were only the pavement markings. Paul and Noel decided to let it go without pressing the charges. They displayed an amazing spirit of forgiveness even though the woman didn’t even ask them to forgive her.
Sherry and I talked in detail about this experience on the way home. We learned just how difficult life can be when a person in a wheel chair is faced with circumstances like we witnessed. While no one was hurt, this was certainly a violation of Paul’s rights in my opinion. He could not make use of his vehicle due to this woman’s choice in parking spaces. Ignorance of the situation is not really an excuse. I have been told that a few times in my life by officers writing tickets for my speeding.
The moral of this story is to be aware of your surroundings and how your seemingly innocent actions may affect others. Use common sense when arriving late to a function. If most all of the spaces in the parking lot are full then you should look very carefully before parking in that one little space right near the building. It is probably vacant for a reason. And by all means, DO NOT park in a handicap space if you are not transporting a handicap person regardless of how far you might have to walk.
