Our apartment seems to be ADA accessible. I figure this due to the following:
- There are no stairs or steps. There is a curved lip between the kitchen tile and the wood in the dining room. Easy for a chair or crutches.
- The bathroom. OMG, the bathroom. There's a shower stall, with hand grippers. It is big enough for a chair.
- The building is an elevator building, and there's no steps or stairs to get in.
And while the radio says I should thanks GHW Bush for these things, I am pretty sure there's thousands of Americans with disabilities who crawled up the steps of the capital who get most of the credit.
Remember that as GHW Bush is being sainted; he only acted after dozens of Americans crawled the steps of the capital. It had passed the Senate a year ago and was languishing in the House.
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How high are the countertops and switches? Are there wrapped pipes and room for a chair to be wheeled underneath a sink? Individual units would not be accessible based on the ADA: ADA is basically the public spaces. [grinning]
ReplyDelete[added note: Previous comment mostly in regards to the fact that there are other important protections for the disabled, without intending to draw away from the importance of the ADA. huduser.gov - www.huduser.gov/portal/publications/PDF/FAIRHOUSING/fairfull.pdf discusses several from the Fair Housing Act (as implemented in 1991), and, of course, Section 504 requirements...]
ReplyDelete{The reason this comes up more often than not isn't actually structural, but cultural; the Fair Housing Act covers emotional support animals, while the ADA handles assistance animals. Very different rules as to what you can bring into public spaces...}
Meera Barry What you are saying is important.
ReplyDeleteI do want to keep the attention, such as it is, on the very high level of effort and engagement required by Americans with Disabilities that was required to get the ADA passed.
That I get to benefit from handholds and a lack of stairs is far secondary; the key thing I want to have attention on is the GHW Bush was no saint.
Agreed! I would definitely cheer the fact that the ADA became such a part of public consciousness that it has become the almost generic term for accessibility. It has a long way to go as there's still a lot of different considerations to be made, but that said, yes, it took a lot of different groups fighting for a lot of equality, and a lot of blood.
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