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Doing Wheelies Around the ADA
By Laurel Holliday
The entrance to City Cafe in Fremont. Inset: the unsigned wheelchair entrance. Laurel Holliday photo inset: Sara Longley photo |
Are Seattle Businesses Complying with the Americans with Disabilities Act?
My partner, Kate, is about to "celebrate" the sixth anniversary of her multiple sclerosis diagnosis. Her wobbly legs still get her around Seattle fairly well, but odds are that soon she'll be unable to walk more than a short distance. We've been wondering what life will be like when she'll need a wheelchair to do the ordinary, everyday things we enjoy, like grabbing a latte or going shopping. So, a couple of days ago, we rented a wheelchair for a trial run.
Getting in the Door
We only had to go a few blocks from our house to find the City Cafe, next to Video Isle on Fremont Avenue North, where we couldn't figure out how to get Kate's wheelchair up the six steps leading to the front door. I climbed the stairs and went inside to ask if there is wheelchair access. The man at the counter assured me there is, but then he described a complicated route that involved going to the other side of the building, finding a buzzer outside the foyer of the apartments above the building, getting buzzed in, and then wheeling through to the cafe.
"Is the route to the buzzer and the buzzer marked with a handicapped sign?" I asked, uncertain that I could find it from his directions.
"No," he said. "It just says 'City Cafe'."
"Okay, thanks," I said, shaking my head. How can anyone be expected to know that this accessible entrance exists, much less navigate the convoluted route to the entrance at the back of the far side of the building, which is not even visible from the street? The Americans With Disabilities Act requires that routes to handicap accessible entrances, and the entrances themselves, be clearly signed.
Blocked by a wall of spaghetti sauce at Trader Joe's. Laurel Holliday photo |
Wheeling the Aisles
Next, Kate and I cruised down to the Trader Joe's on lower Queen Anne. This one opened on November 19, 1997 (five years after the ADA took effect), so we expected that it would provide good access for people with disabilities.
Wrong! One of the aisles was actually blocked dead-center by a floor-to-ceiling pillar and a tall stack of spaghetti sauce.
According to the requirements of the Americans With Disabilities Act, aisles must be 36 inches wide, so the next day I called the store manager, Micheal Krause, to report the problem. To his credit, he admitted that they had built the spaghetti sauce display too close to the pillar. "It is not in compliance," he said, and he promised me that he was already in the process of solving the problem by removing the spaghetti sauce display.
Just out of reach: Marketime's great wine section. Laurel Holliday photo |
We took the wheelchair out for a spin again the next day, and stopped by Marketime to pick up a bottle of wine for dinner.
We didn't have to go any further than the first aisle before we discovered that Kate couldn't reach more than one row of the wine because of all the bottles of wine stacked in crates along the floor.
Even though Marketime has been around as long as most of us can remember, the ADA requires that barriers, even in older structures, must be removed when their removal is "readily achievable"--which is defined as "easily accomplished and without much difficulty or expense."
"I realize that there are areas of the store that are very difficult for disabled people to deal with," one of the store's owners, Greg Giles, said. "In the next few days, I'll have to find a different way to merchandise the wine in the boxes."
On the day Kate and I visited Marketime, the ATM and the pay telephone were both inaccessible to customers in wheelchairs, and one aisle was lined with cartons, which served both as obstacles to travel and as barriers to reaching all of the items shelved behind them.
"I think we can do better," said Giles, "but we would probably be out of business if we had to totally comply with the ADA."
Navigating the maze at the Gap Laurel Holliday photo |
Next Kate and I made our way over to The Gap and the Eddie Bauer store in University Village. I shot one photo of Kate, her wheelchair stuck between the racks of clothes in Eddie Bauer, before the manager told me that I couldn't take photos without giving several days notice and obtaining permission from someone at Eddie Bauer's corporate offices.
A few months ago I asked an Eddie Bauer clerk how people with disabilities were supposed to view their clothes, when the racks were too close to move through. She said that the racks were on wheels. "All they have to do is ask us, and we'll move them," she said.
When a person using a wheelchair has to find clerks and ask them to move heavy racks around in order to see what's on them, and able-bodied people do not, is there really the equal access to goods and merchandise that the ADA requires?
Next door, at The Gap, we found the same problems of rolling racks jammed up against each other, and a new challenge--a zigzag checkout queue. As hard as Kate tried, she couldn't get her manual wheelchair through it without rolling across the bases of the posts.
The issue of zigzag checkout queues has already been addressed in a federal class action lawsuit brought against Wendy's Old-Fashioned Hamburgers. As part of a settlement, Wendy's agreed to remove or completely restructure their checkout queues so that people in wheelchairs can easily navigate them.
Stacked boxes and a solid pillar block the way at Big Kmart. Laurel Holliday photo |
Because the Kmart on North Aurora was completely renovated in 1999, it is required by the ADA to meet the same accessibility standards as new construction. And, maybe on the day the remodel was completed, it did. But when Kate and I journeyed through Martha Stewart land a few days ago, we discovered that many aisles were impassable in a wheelchair because of hundreds of boxes (some opened and empty, and others awaiting unpacking) which had been strewn about the aisles with seeming abandon.
A class-action discrimination lawsuit has been filed in Federal Court against Kmart, alleging, among many other things, that a significant amount of their merchandise is inaccessible to people with disabilities because of stacks of boxes blocking the aisles.
Kmart corporate spokesperson Julie Francker said, "Boxes are of a temporary nature, and they aren't covered by the ADA. All of our stores, built or remodeled since 1993, are in complete compliance with the ADA."
Laurel Holliday writes books and articles in her home office in Fremont.
Reader Comments
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| Roxanne Vierra | Feb 05, 2002 | Seattle, WA | Civil Rights Specialist |
| People with disabilities who encounter access problems such as those outlined in this article can file free discrimination complaints with a civil rights agency. In Seattle, contact Seattle Office for Civil Rights at 684-4500. In King County, contact King County Office of Civil Rights, 296-7592. Elsewhere in the state, contact the WA State Human Rights Commission at 464-6500. Exercise your rights! | |||
| Gail Ehlenberger | Dec 29, 2002 | Redmond | |
| Just received an e-mail from German friend planning visit this summer. Is there a travel guide of Seattle for wheelchair bound people? | |||
| Tony Lee | Nov 10, 2004 | Seattle, WA | ADA Advocate |
| I am not disabled and have been in Seattle for about 4 months. I advocate for disability rights in the public right-a-way and dealings with public accommodations. I have several accomplishments with various businesses here, however, have had difficulty finding support in matters regarding the City of Seattle. I am currently compiling a class action against the City of Seattle and regarding the failure to comply with the ADA in reconstruction of sidewalks and curbramps, including (but not limited to) improper stripings at crosswalks. If there is anyone that can support my endeavors effort in this (and other) matter(s) please email me at ada_adaag@yahoo.com. I find that, although businesses in Seattle claim Grandfather Law to avoid being compliant to the ADA, it is important for people to know that; WHEN CONGRESS IMPLEMENTED THE ADA IN 1990 AND THE GRANDFATHER CLAUSE OF THE ACT, THE "KEY WORDS" OF APPLICABILITY ARE "readily achievable." READ THIS PDF FILE: http://www.evanterry.com/5b.pdf. As for myself, use my own finances for travel (via Greyhound) and all other expenses. Often times find myself with very limited resources and computer/Internet access. Please email me if anyone is able to provide myself any type of assistance. Or if you would like additional past accomplishments abroad, inquire via email and I will forward emails to you. Thank You | |||
