When the stadium first opened in 2005, there was 66 parking places set aside for disabled supporters who are Blue Badge holders. However, a year later and witn ACL making losses, it was decided to reconfigure the car parking and remove those places.
Since the start of the 2006/07 season,disabled supporters have had to pay to park at the Arena and this has led the ACL Chief to issue the following statement.
"There appears to be some confusion over an apparent change in policy for the sale of match day car parking spaces to disabled users and the inability to buy disabled car parking tickets on the day.
"On review of our operating procedures from last season, a number of concerns had been raised about the safety of car parking attendants receiving cash directly for spaces in car parks A and B on the main site.
"This coupled with feedback from the police over the transport problems caused by the number of visitors turning into Judds Lane without a valid ticket or pass led us to introduce pre-purchase tickets only for car parks A and B.
"Separate to this, as with any other season, there were 140 seasonal disabled car parking passes available at a concession which were quickly sold out. These concessions varied from £125 to £143 depending on when they were purchased.
"Disability is about access rather than price as it would be discriminatory to imply otherwise. The availability of concessions is traditionally linked to income and it is not uncommon for the overall availability of discounted tickets to be capped depending on the total number of available tickets. Airlines and train operators provide a good illustration of this.
"However, following internal consultation we have further reviewed our operating procedures and from September 1, the following changes will come into force:
"Firstly, twenty additional seasonal disabled spaces will become available in a designated area in car park A at a price of just £175. With a guaranteed minimum of 21 league matches left, this works out at £8.33 per game.
"Secondly, a further 20 car park spaces for disabled users in Car Park A will be available to be bought on the day from the ticket office before 1pm on Saturdays (3.30pm for late TV games) and 6.30pm on weekday evening fixtures. If purchased on the day, they will be at the full price of £10.
"We would like to re-iterate that we take these matters very seriously and as has been demonstrated here, we are prepared to change our policies if it is warranted, however well intentioned the original plans may have been."We hope that these subsequent changes will satisfy our disabled users and would ask that any future queries be emailed to car.parking@ricoharena.com for the attention of Daniel Salotra."