British Parking Association to manage DPA 

Disabled Motoring UK launched its Disabled Parking Accreditation (DPA) in June 2014 with a primary goal of improving car parks for disabled people and reducing the abuse of disabled bays. It is hoped that by encouraging car parks to sign up to the scheme disabled people will be able to find a car park in their area which is completely accessible. If a disabled person arrives at their destination to find that the car park facilities are not accessible or that all of the disabled bays are full because the car park does not police them properly, they are often faced with no option but to go home without completing the activity they went out to do. This is why knowing that a car park is accessible and that disabled bays are properly monitored and enforced before they arrive at a car park is a real benefit to a disabled motorist.

Car parks which qualify for the DPA will be demonstrating to their disabled customers that they are committed to creating high quality accessible parking facilities.

Disabled Motoring UK has now reached an agreement with the British Parking Association (BPA) to administer the scheme on behalf of the charity. This agreement means that the charity can focus more of its time on our vital campaigning work supporting disabled motorists. The BPA will manage the scheme with DMUK having the final sign off on car parks achieving the accreditation.

DMUK Chief Executive, Graham Footer, said: “The charity has spent a lot of time and effort developing the Disabled Parking Award and we are really pleased that since its launch in 2014 we have well over 100 car parks that have achieved the accreditation. We feel that now is the time to use a third party to take over the daily running of the DPA, freeing the staff at DMUK to focus on helping disabled motorists. I am very pleased that the BPA have seen the value in the charity’s DPA and the charity looks forward to working with them to make sure that as many car parks as possible meet the needs of disabled people”

Kelvin Reynolds, BPA Director of Policy & Public Affairs said: “The BPA is very pleased to support DMUK. We are in daily contact with people who own and operate car parks, carrying out assessments for Park Mark and our Approved Operators Scheme so it makes sense that we talk to them about their facilities for disabled motorists too. In doing so we will be able to make life better for disabled motorists and also reward operators who provide the more accessible parking.”