Handicapped Parking Issues

I been at BYU for 5 years now. There have been umpteen times when I have seen people park in the handicapped spot without a permit. Other times I have been astounded that people getting down from the car appear perfectly healthy and normal even when they have a permit. There was girl once who was bragging to one of my friends about how she had gotten a temporary permit when she twisted her ankle once. The ankle healed in a month but since she had a year long permit. This enabled her to get good parking for a year. Well this can atleast be explained with the fact that parking on university campuses is always tenacious.

There are some facts of which authorities who design handicapped parking are not even aware of. Even when people are not misusing the handicapped parking there are many times that all the handicapped slots are simply full. There are many places where they have very few handicapped slots. Among those slots here lies the problem: whenever there is a handicapped slot there always some extra space next to the parking lot for people with wheelchairs to get in the wheelchair. A lot of handicapped passes are handed out to old people, people with heart conditions, people who use crutches etc. There is a integral difference between afore mentioned people and people in wheelchairs. People in wheelchairs actually need the next space next to the parking lots to be able to get out of the car and get into the wheelchair. The others just need a parking spot close to their destination. If the local authorithes could realize this fact, and mark certain spots for people in wheelchairs only this could resolve a lot of issues. It is a lot harder for people in wheelchairs if they don't find an accessible spot compared to the other people with handicapped permits. I cannnot even think of getting a car modified so I could drive it because my horror lies what if I don't find any empty handicapped parking slots. There is no way I could park the car and get out of it.