Easter Seals Project ACTION (ESPA)
ESPA is a federally funded training and technical assistance center cooperative agreement between Easter Seals, Inc. and the U.S. Department of Transportation Federal Transit Administration. It promotes cooperation between the transportation industry and the disability community to increase mobility for people with disabilities under the ADA and beyond.
Uber: Disability Laws Don’t Apply to Us
Is Uber letting its drivers dodge The Americans With Disabilities Act? Sometimes it slips Kristin Parisi’s mind that she’s disabled. After 25 years in a wheelchair—the result of a car accident when she was 5 years old—her means of transportation no longer registers as abnormal.
Lee Swinscoe
Consulting Manager at Universal Designers & Consultants, Inc. (UD&C) ADA/FHA Accessibility Specialist Lee Swinscoe began working with UD&C in 2004 and became a fulltime team member in 2006. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Architecture Degree from the University of Maryland. He received his certification in the Certified Access Specialist program (CASp) in 2010 […]
The City of New Orleans Drafting a Public Right-of-Way Transition Plan
The city of New Orleans is drafting a public right-of-way transition plan that will provide a blueprint for addressing accessibility needs for people with disabilities, and will establish priorities to enhance pedestrian access routes on city streets. The street enhancements will include curb ramps, accessible pedestrian signals and transit stops. The plan is being overseen […]
Web Accessibility Lawsuits
An article in the Wall Street Journal explored the issue of web accessibility, accessibility lawsuits and the possibility that the U.S. Department of Justice will issue new web accessibility regulations later this year. The article talks about the 2008 Target settlement, which was the first to recognize that a website can be a place of […]
Improving ADA Paratransit Demand Estimation: Regional Modeling
The Transportation Research Board’s Transit Cooperative Research Program has published a report, TCRP Report 158: Improving ADA Paratransit Demand Estimation: Regional Modeling, which includes planning models to help regional, state, and federal agencies that oversee public transportation plan for the projected future demands of ADA paratransit. The report, also includes planning models that predict travel by […]
State to Seek ADA Waiver for Amtrak Platform Redesign
Milwaukee Governor Scott Walker’s administration has stated that they will be seeking a formal exception from the ADA’s level boarding requirement in order to proceed with an inaccessible renovation of the city’s passenger train concourse. The plans for the station’s redesign did not take into consideration the Federal Railroad Administration’s new accessibility guidelines which took […]
DOJ Releases a Report on Accessibility of Federal Government Electronic and Information Technology
The DOJ has released its Section 508 report, “Accessibility of Federal Electronic and Information Technology,” to the President and Congress. The report provides findings based on a survey of federal agencies on the accessibility of their electronic and information technology (EIT) and the procedures used to implement Section 508. From 2010 to 2011 the DOJ […]
Ramps Blended into Stairs
Pictures of ramps incorporated into stairs have been gaining some attention on architecture and design blogs. While some of these designs are indeed beautiful to look at, they tend to be inaccessible, not ADA compliant, and downright unsafe. The ramp pictured to the left is located in Vancouver, Canada, so it is not required to […]
RNIB Gets Tough With bmibaby Over Accessibility
The Royal National Institute of Blind People (RNIBP) has sued the UK airline, bimbaby, over the accessibility of its website. People using screen readers or non-mouse navigation were unable to buy plane tickets online, and were instead directed towards buying tickets by phone, at times paying fees to do so. Customers were also concerned that […]