With this week being the 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, it seems appropriate to comment on how the use of disabled placards impacts parking.

Everyone knows that parking can be a huge headache in a congested city. But the process is increasingly difficult for disabled drivers. We believe that those with mobility or accessibility challenges can truly benefit from accommodations like designated parking spaces, extended time limits and special pricing. But quite often the disabled driver placards are fraudulently used or distributed without proper regulation – leading to an abuse of the system and making it even harder for those that are truly disabled to access available parking.

Fybr has a solution: Smart Placards. Eliminating the outdated one-size-fits-all permits, these tags communicate with the Fybr network to deliver the accommodations appropriate for each individual disabled driver’s needs – allowing customization of things like time limits and rates. Fybr’s Smart Placards can also help make compliance fairer and easier for PEO’s to monitor by sending violation notifications in real-time.

States like Illinois, New York and Oregon have already updated their disabled driver systems with great success – resulting in communities with decreased congestion in high-demand areas, more fairness for the disabled population, and increases in both turnover and revenue. Additional revenue can then be reinvested in the community in the form of services like curb ramps, dial-a-ride and ADA accessible spaces.