About 2 months ago the University of Illinois decided to put parking meters up in all of their Handicap Parking spots. These spots are in reserved parking lots owned by the University. The University is perfectly within their rights to do this.
In 2014 the state of Illinois said it was OK to put meters up at all handicap spaces. The state does issue special placards for those who would have trouble getting to a meter to pay it, but folks with the regular blue and white placards are expected to feed the meter, just like everyone else.
In reserved parking lots, you need to pay for a permit to park there. Now, you also have to pay .75 per /hr to park in a handicap spot in that reserved lot. That's $7.00 a day for an average 9 hour work day plus travel time to and from the parking lot, on top of the monthly ~$40 / month for the lot permit. Everyone else who parks in the lot only pays the monthly fee. They don't feed a meter.
From what I've seen, most of the handicap spaces on campus now go unused.
Folks don't like to have to double pay in order to park their cars for the work day.
Most handicap placard holders are probably doing what I had to do: provide extra documentation to the University (my placard wasn't enough) and pay extra to have my own, 24/7 reserved space, which is closer to my office than the handicap spot I used to use and cost the University more money to put up the permanent sign required.
On a side note, the cities of Champaign and Urbana still have free handicap spots on the street and in municipal lots.
I'm sure there's another side to this story, but I don't know what it is.
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