"Fans who require the use of accessible entrances or the lifts to reach concourses can apply for a wristband, which will allow access to be given without having to share specific details with stewards.
Yeah, it is late in the day. And on the parking long story short, no, not really.
I think Sunday is going to be a difficult day for many disabled fans - EDSA got a lot of feedback after Roma and that was with a staggered finish after the legends game.
As ever, to be fair to EDSA they are doing their best and they have to be measured I am sure in what they can say publicly.
The thing is if a fraction of the energy the club has put in to extracting every last penny out of fans with the ground move had gone into making sure disabled fans *at least* had the provision they already had at Goodison, this could have been averted.
The club is focusing attention on what they are doing on the footprint, but the 'getting there' issue remains the key one.
I would imagine the "getting there" but also falls under the responsibility of the local authority as well to be fair to the club, not that it should give them an easy out. I cant imagine that it would cost that much in the greater scheme of all the money that's chucked around in the game these days, to sort something out? its a big site, there must be somewhere they can put aside for disabled parking? even if it can be right next to the stadium, get a couple of golf carts and a couple of stewards on to drive them? (I have no idea if that would help but in my head it would)
Absolutley agree no doubt the local authority is at fault here. The problem is Everton has no control over that.
On the other hand, going back to the previous post, they could have chosen to run their own shuttles from accessible parking elsewhere (rather than Sandhills), and as you suggest could have chosen to let space for more accessible parking (rather than going on about how much there is on the footprint whilst failing to acknowledge the net loss with the loss of Stanley Park and the Blue Base).
Instead the energy has been focused on how much coin can be made off the footprint. This has had all sorts of knock-on effects that aren't good for disabled people. Spart's post below about people with their own dietary requirements needed to take their own food in being another example.
The will just hasn't been there. And the frustrating thing is the club was great at this at Goodison and worked closely with EITC and EDSA to deliver a good experience for disables people.
In a way I think disabled fans are the canary in the coalmine for everyone else. Part of me thinks the reason transport is so bad and the club haven't done enough is quite simple. If, as I have posted before, the plan is to cycle out the existing fanbase then you don't really need to worry about the existing fanbase for more than another few seasons. We are a bridge to the future and no more.
Day-tripper fans won't mind being kettled the way regular fans don't mind it at Cup Finals, as it is a one-off. As for disabled fans, it's easier to manage the expectations of irregular visitors than STHs.
This goes to a wider point. A friend at United told me 'you have to understand our club doesn't csre about season-ticket holders. They are an inconvenience. They have ideas about what the club should be. They hold protests. They cause hassle. Day-trippers don't do that. They spend a fortune on merch, quietly show up in their replicas, and don't embarass the club. That's the model all ownership groups want.'
Nothing original in the link below, but just a bit on the wider picture.
on August 20, 2025, 7:35 pm