In early December, I had the opportunity to attend the ADA National Network Project Director’s Meeting in Washington, D.C. These meetings occur twice a year and offer the ADA Center Directors a chance to understand how the network is operating and to receive insights from various Federal departments. One of the Federal agency representatives we heard from was Kelly Buckland from the Department of Transportation.
Mr. Buckland was appointed the Disability Policy Advisor to the US Department of Transportation by President Biden. During his time at the Department, Mr. Buckland established 4 priorities for DoT policies that affect people with disabilities. These “pillars” for policy prioritization are:
- Enabling safe and accessible air travel;
- Enabling multimodal accessibility of public transportation facilities, vehicles, and rights-of-way;
- Enabling access to good-paying jobs and business opportunities for people with disabilities and;
- Enabling accessibility of electric vehicles and automated vehicles.
Mr. Buckland was frank about sharing his experiences traveling as a wheelchair user. He explained that he doesn’t fly unless he has to. He views the act of flying as dangerous and inequitable to wheelchair users. He wanted to use his position in the Department to make meaningful improvements to areas that the DoT has authority over to improve the experiences of people with disabilities in the future. I want to share some of the insights from that meeting today.
One push he wants to see is new standards for accessible restrooms on single aisle aircraft. Currently, there is no mandatory requirement for restrooms to be accessible on airplanes that have 1 aisle running down the length of the plane. The message is clear to people with disabilities: “these restrooms are not for you.”
Mr. Buckland advised the DoT to conduct research into the viability of providing wheelchair spaces on planes. These spaces would allow wheelchair users to sit in their own chairs while flying. If ground transportation is required to provide these spaces, why should people who fly be treated differently? The real answer is that airlines don’t want to budge from the way they have always done things. The research studies the minimum strength requirements of standard wheelchairs in the event of a crash, crash securement devices for wheelchairs, and how to logistically provide normal aircraft devices that are normally located in or around a traditional seat, like a floatation device or air mask. So far, it’s been found that the minimum G-force a wheelchair should have to be safe in the event of a crash is 12Gs. Normal wheelchairs are generally rated for 19Gs. It’s also been found that a standard 4-strap securement device is acceptable for aircraft travel.
There’s nothing stopping airlines from voluntarily developing their own systems to accommodate a wheelchair user’s personal chair. They only need to submit their designs for FAA approval. I’m aware that some airlines are starting to shift their thinking about this subject. A system that uses a removeable chair for the wheelchair space doesn’t force the airline to give up a seat to sell if the wheelchair space is not needed on any given flight. Allowing a person to use their own chair vastly reduces the probability of the airline damaging the chair and having to pay to repair or replace it. Hopefully, the airlines are less resistant to this idea and a mandatory standard can be established to allow wheelchair users greater peace of mind when flying. Delta Airlines is currently in a testing phase for a removable seat for wheelchair spaces. Known problems to be solved are that these spaces are too narrow for manual chairs and too shallow for power chairs.
We were told that the DoT was going to adopt PROWAG (Public Right-of-Way Accessibility Guidelines) as an enforceable standard. Since then, the Department of Transportation has adopted PROWAG for DoT facilities. The DoT also allocated a huge amount of money to help make certain legacy rail stations accessible. These rail stations, located in Chicago and New York, are very old, very well-traveled, and historically very inaccessible. The Bipartisan Infrastructure Law has provided an unprecedented amount of funding for airports to make improvements which affect their accessibility for people with disabilities.
The last piece of interesting news we heard from Mr. Buckland is that the $50 million fine placed on American Airlines for disability discrimination was based on the total number of complaints the DoT received during a given time period. This means that complaints filed with DoT have a meaningful impact against offending airlines. That was very refreshing to understand.
I genuinely had a good time in D.C. at the Project Director’s meeting. It was great to hear from Mr. Buckland and to see how collaboration is fostered within the ADA National Network.