BY PAUL McELWEE

MOTORISTS in Strabane will have to watch where they park as fines have been introduced in one of the new stores in the town. The new ASDA store, based in Branch Road, has recently introduced fines for people parking in the disabled bays without the mandatory blue badge.

The Scheme is only temporary at the moment, a 12 month trial period is underway in stores in Merseyside. The trial period is being used to assess the impact on Christmas and summer holiday shopping. If they are a success, the plan is to have them nation-wide.

Since the trial is just under way a few weeks, it will not be implemented until next year, but the

SURVEY

A recent survey from campaign group Baywatch shows that more than one in five disabled parking bays are being taken up by non disabled people. According to the survey, almost 21% of disabled parking bays were occupied illegally, compared with 18.5% last year.

If a non-disabled driver is seen in a disabled parking bay, they should expect to receive a a £60 fine. Various schemes in the past have been used to dissuade people from abusing parking. These include car park hosts reminding people not to park in unauthorised bays; leafleting cars; re-painting all disabled bays blue; ASDA Baywatch awareness campaign; and the SpaceHog. The SpaceHog is a loudspeaker device which play a message reminding motorists that they are entering a disabled parking bay.

DETERRENT

Morrow Communications, which is spearheading the initiative, would like to stress that this is meant to be a deterrent, not a nuisance. Claire Bonner, spokesperson for Morrow Communications, said:

"The idea is not to stick a lot of fines on people, its merely a deterrent to stop them parking. It seems to be working quite well. The idea is to start off with the trial area then roll it out to other stores in Northern Ireland."

"It's a really big step because no other big shop is doing anything like this. It has received a lot of publicity, a lot of people are jumping on it. The abuse of the mother and child bays are atrocious but the disabled bays are even worse. They do it all the time and don't realise that by paring in a bay not for them, they are stopping someone else from doing their weekly shopping."