York Blue badge ban mitigation measures still not in place a year on

A series of measures to improve accessibility for disabled people were agreed by City of York Council after the decision to permanently ban blue badge holders from parking in the city’s footstreets in November 2021.

But over a year later, campaigners and councillors have questioned why several of the promised measures have not yet been implemented.

These include more city centre seating, improved access to disabled toilets and expanded provision of mobility aids.

Cllr Jonny Crawshaw, chair of the customer and corporate services scrutiny committee, said: “There was deep unease about the decision at the time and a significant amount was placed on the idea that this access strategy would solve a lot of the problems within the first year of the ban having come into place.

“Actually the reality now would appear to be that we’re looking at another year potentially before a lot of these things have come into place.”

Disability rights campaigner Flick Williams told the committee: “More promised consultations, feasibility studies and intentions to seek funding mitigations are of course required to be delivered at the time of an adverse impact being identified for persons with a protected characteristic.”

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Director of transport, environment and planning James Gilchrist said several measures were in place, such as extra funding for the Shopmobility and Dial-a-Ride services, as well as additional disabled parking bays outside of the footstreets.

Dropped kerbs have been added to Stonegate, with highways improvements also underway in Fossgate and Blake Street.

Cllr Pete Kilbane asked: “Wouldn’t it have made more sense to have had the mitigations in place before taking away the access?”

Mr Gilchrist said: “I agree – if I had a magic wand, we would do the mitigations first, but the process didn’t fall like that.”

Cllr Katie Lomas questioned how effective the mitigations would be and how the council would measure this.

Mr Gilchrist said that the council had always acknowledged that, for some people, no mitigation measure would be sufficient to replace what had been lost through the loss of blue badge parking.

A key part of the council’s plans was the recruitment of a specialist access officer, David Smith, who has only just taken up the role due to difficulties in recruiting.

He said he had been given a lot of work – but that this was a good thing – and that new dates for completing some of the measures were now agreed.

He added: “I’m now held accountable for those dates. I need to give myself some clear deadlines and something for you to be able to challenge us on if we’re not getting it done.

“This is a really exciting time. I haven’t been so enthusiastic about a job in many years. As challenging as it is, there are some fantastic people that work in this council.”