The Americans with Disabilities Act requires many businesses, commercial facilities and office buildings to comply with specific access standards.
A new group has flooded the Valley with lawsuits, alleging businesses of having parking lots that are out of ADA compliance.
FULL COVERAGE: Cash for compliance? ADA lawsuits flood Valley
ABC15, with the help of ADA experts, has compiled the following information that businesses need to know to make sure their parking lots are complaint, serve the disability community, and avoid a lawsuit.
There are two types of accessible spaces: car assessable and van accessible. In the graphic below, learn what size spaces need to be and what height signs must be set.
The ADA also requires that locations must have enough accessible parking spots. This table shows how many accessible spaces are needed.
| Total Parking Spaces Provided | Required Number of Accessible Spaces |
|---|---|
| 1-25 | 1 |
| 26-50 | 2 |
| 51-75 | 3 |
| 76-100 | 4 |
| 101-150 | 5 |
| 151-200 | 6 |
| 201-300 | 7 |
| 301-400 | 8 |
| 401-500 | 9 |
| 501-1,000 | 2% of total |
| 1001+ | 20 plus 1 for every 100 spaces |
Important note on van-accessible spaces: One of every six accessible parking spaces must be “van-accessible.” That means if a parking lot needs only one accessible spaces, it must be van-accessible. Here's a larger example: If a parking lot has 400 total spaces, it needs 8 accessible spaces, and two of those eight spaces must be van-accessible.
There are other standards to be aware of including parking lot grade and ramp steepness, experts said. If in doubt, call an ADA compliance expert to evaluate the parking lot.
A downloadable guide of ADA standards from ADA.gov is below.
ADA.gov Standards by Dave Biscobing on Scribd
