by Gareth Cross
The time it takes for new disabled parking bays to be installed in Derry is 'far too long', a local councillor has said.
SDLP councillor Brian Tierney was speaking at a meeting of Derry City and Strabane District Council's Environment and Regeneration Committee at the Guildhall last week.
At the meeting councillors listened to a presentation from Declan McBride of Transport NI.
Mr McBride outlined the application process for people who want disabled parking bays installed at their home or place of work.
He told councillors that bays "usually take six months" to complete as long as there are no objections to the process.
Cllr Tierney said that issues around disabled parking bays have 'been a real bugbear' of his.
He said that he knew of instances were it took up to nine months for bays to be installed.
Cllr Tierney told the meeting that the bays cannot be installed until a contractor comes from Belfast to carry out the work and said this needed to happen quicker.
He said that the application process seems like it 'wanted people to jump through hoops' to get bays.
Cllr Tierney said that people didn't want bays, that they needed them to 'make their life easier'.
He called for action to make the process quicker and more effective.
Mr McBride said that the process would be quicker if it was carried out more locally and noted that a Transport NI facility in Strabane had this capability.
He told council that he would keep a personal eye on the issue and that Transport NI were 'looking at other options'.
Cllr Tierney said that contractors were waiting until 6-9 bays were needed before coming from Belfast and suggested it would be quicker to carry out the work in batches of 2-3.
DUP councillor Graham Warke said that a lack of disabled bays and disability vehicle access in the town centre was making it difficult for people with disabilities or disabled children to go shopping.
Alderman Warke said that the only place they could park was a coach car park with special arrangement and asked for the issue to be looked at.
Mr McBride said more spaces were needed in the Diamond issue and recognised there was a 'very real need' to examine the case.
Sinn Fein councillor Tony Hassan called for more bays and someone locally to carry out the work.
Cllr Hassan said that people who previously had bays with the old yellow markings had been unable to have them changed over.
UUP councillor Derek Hussey said that action should be taken against those who improperly use disabled bays.
Mr McBride said that enforcement wardens 'have their beats' but that they were unable to police residential or rural areas.
He said Transport NI relied on people to report abuse of disabled parking bays in those areas.
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