NOTICE OF AVAILABILITY OF DRAFT PUBLIC RIGHTS-OF-WAY
ACCESSIBILITY GUIDELINES

The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) recognizes and protects the civil rights of people with disabilities and is modeled after earlier landmark laws prohibiting discrimination on the basis of race and gender. To ensure that buildings and facilities are accessible to and usable by people with disabilities, the ADA establishes accessibility requirements for State and local government facilities, places of public accommodation, and commercial facilities. Under the ADA, the Access Board has developed and continues to maintain design guidelines for accessible buildings and facilities known as the ADA Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG). ADAAG covers a wide variety of facilities and establishes minimum requirements for new construction and alterations.

The Board maintains a similar responsibility for accessibility guidelines under the Architectural Barriers Act (ABA). The ABA requires access to certain facilities designed, built, altered, or leased with Federal funds. Like ADAAG, the Board’s ABA accessibility guidelines apply to new construction and alterations.

The Board’s guidelines become enforceable when they are adopted by the standard setting agency for the ADA and the ABA. The agencies responsible for standards under the ADA are the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Department of Transportation (DOT). The agencies responsible for standards under the ABA are the General Services Administration (GSA), the Department of Defense (DOD), the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and the United States Postal Service (USPS).

The Board plans to undertake rulemaking to supplement its ADA and ABA accessibility guidelines, which primarily cover facilities on sites, by adding new provisions specific to public rights-of-way. The Board’s aim is to ensure that access for persons with disabilities is provided wherever a pedestrian way is newly built or altered, and that the same degree of convenience, connection, and safety afforded the public generally is available to pedestrians with disabilities. The guidelines would not require alterations to existing public rights-of-way, but would apply where a pedestrian route or facility is altered as part of a planned project to improve existing public rights-of-way.

BACKGROUND

The Need for Guidelines on Public Rights-of-Way

Local jurisdictions, and other entities covered by the ADA or ABA, must ensure that the facilities they build or alter are accessible to people with disabilities. The Board’s ADA and ABA accessibility guidelines specify the minimum level of accessibility in new construction and alteration projects and serve as the basis for enforceable standards maintained by other agencies. Currently, the Board’s guidelines, like the industry standards from which they derive, focus mainly on facilities on sites. While they address certain features common to public sidewalks, such as curb ramps, accessible routes, ground and floor surfaces, and bus stops and shelters, further guidance is necessary to address conditions unique to public rights-of-way. Various

constraints posed by space limitations at sidewalks, roadway design practices, slope, and terrain raise valid questions on how and to what extent access can be achieved. Access for blind pedestrians at street crossings and wheelchair access to on-street parking are typical of the issues for which additional guidance is needed. In addition, new trends in roadway design, such as the growing use of traffic roundabouts, pose additional challenges to access, while various technological innovations, particularly those pertaining to pedestrian signaling devices, offer new solutions.

The Board previously proposed guidelines for public rights-of-way under the ADA which were published for public comment in 1992 and 1994. Based on the comments received, the Board determined that it should further coordinate with the transportation industry and State and local governments before continuing its rulemaking. Consequently, the Board undertook an outreach and training program on accessible public rights-of-way. Under this program, the Board developed a series of videos, an accessibility checklist, and a design guide on accessible public rights-of-way. In addition, the Board sponsored research on tactile warnings at street crossings, accessible pedestrian signals, and traffic roundabouts. The Board has made this information
widely available to the public. The interest in these materials has underscored the need for criteria for public rights-of-way that are definitive and enforceable so that local jurisdictions and others are clear on their obligations when constructing or altering streets and sidewalks.

Public Rights-of-Way Access Advisory Committee

In resuming its rulemaking effort, the Board chartered an advisory committee in 1999 to develop
recommendations on guidelines for accessible public rights-of-way. Use of advisory committees has become a standard practice in the Board’s process for developing and updating design requirements. Through such committees, interested groups, including those representing designers, industry, and people with disabilities, play a substantive role in recommending to the Board the content of the guidelines to be developed. These committees provide significant sources of expertise while enhancing the level of consensus among stakeholders in advance of proposing a rule for public comment.

The Public Rights-of-Way Access Advisory Committee was composed of 33 members representing disability organizations, public works departments, transportation and traffic engineering groups, design professionals and civil engineers, government agencies, and standards-setting bodies. The committee coordinated its efforts with leading trade organizations represented on the committee, such as the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, and federal agencies, such as the Federal HighwayAdministration, to ensure that its recommendations were consistent with generally accepted practice among design professionals. The committee organized several subcommittees focused on key issue areas. The subcommittee structure enabled members to continue work on a tight time schedule between meetings of the full committee and allowed for greater public participation in the process.

The advisory committee met regularly over a year’s time, usually in Washington, D.C. but also in Austin and San Francisco. Its work culminated in the issuance of a report, "Building a True Community," which was submitted to the Board in January 2001 (http://www.accessboard. gov/prowac/commrept/index.htm). The committee’s report provides criteria for the construction or alteration of public rights-of-way that reflects the broad spectrum of expertise

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