Evaluation of Curb Ramp Compliance: Review of Tools, Methods, and Time to Develop Error Tolerances

Principal Investigator(s): Michael J. Olsen
Associate Investigator(s): David Trejo
Graduate Student(s): Erzhuo Che
Project Starting Year: 2020
Project Ending Year: 2023

Description(Abstract):
ADA compliance is critical to ODOT’s mission to provide a safe and reliable multimodal transportation system by allowing equal access to infrastructure, particularly for those with disabilities. One challenge ODOT is facing is the degree of scrutiny of how work is measured and inspected. An unscientific synthesis of nationwide practice by anecdotal observation is that the national ADA requirements are not consistently and systemically met. Due to variations, lack of precision, and confronted with a ‘compliant’ and ‘non-compliant’ measurement, sometimes a compromise is reached declaring the facilities to be ‘compliant’ when it closely conforms to ADA requirements rather than achieving full conformance. However, when these situations are under the scrutiny of third party inspection, they may not pass full compliance with national ADA requirements, resulting in significant costs to ODOT to remediate.  Given these challenges and the legal ramifications of non-compliance, research is necessary to comprehensively evaluate the compliance assessment process for curb ramps to generate best practices for success in increased precision and compliance.