Our daily battle against scourge of selfish parking

A MERSEYSIDE man with serious visual impairments who relies on a guide dog to get around has spoken out about the stresses and dangers he faces every day because of selfish and dangerous pavement parking.

- by LIAM THORP

Scott Keegan is 26 and lives in Birkenhead. He suffers with a range of visual impairments that means he relies on guide dog Ribbon to help him get around. But recently this has been made more and more difficult by the actions of vehicle owners.

Pavement parking has become a huge issue across Merseyside. The ECHO reports regularly on incidents of cars being parked either partly or fully across pavements, blocking pathways for people trying to get past.

While this can create difficulties for anyone, it can be particularly problematic for people with disabilities, those in wheelchairs or parents with prams. There are now calls for a change in the law to tackle this increasing problem.

Scott suffers with Cone-rod dystrophy, a group of inherited eye disorders that cause vision loss due to damage to the light-sensing cells in the retina. He explained: "It affects basically the whole retina in your eye, from colour vision to contrast vision to perception.