Seated comfortably at a breakfast table in his brother-in-law’s two-bedroom College Drive apartment, Lee Forbes tells a story of the day the construction workers came. The LSU campus, Forbes says, was an absolute mess.
Concrete was broken up. Practically every building, from one end of campus to the other, was under construction. Change was in progress.
“At that time, it took them about two years to get all these access ramps modified into all the buildings and all the sidewalks,” Forbes says. “It was a mess, because they couldn’t do everything all at once. Every time you went down there (to campus), something was under construction.”
Forbes, an environmental engineer in Baton Rouge, speaks of the years following the American Disability Act of 1990. With new rules in place — Title III of the ADA required public buildings to meet disability access regulations — LSU went to work, fixing problems some would say had existed for far too long.
Some 10 years later, LSU students go about their day without giving much thought to disability access. The site of a ramp leading into a building — or, just as significantly, the lack thereof — does not catch our eye. Curb cuts, those cemented slopes that stretch from the street to the sidewalk, are simple afterthoughts along the pathway to class.
Except for students with disabilities, for whom every minute detail becomes as noticeable as the lights of Tiger Stadium from the Mississippi River Bridge. Ask Lindsey Thibodeaux, a mass communication major, who has suffered from waist-down paralysis since birth.
Thibodeaux, born with a spinal condition known as spina biffoda, missed his History 2055 class once last year because the elevator in Lockett Hall was broken. What’s more, Thibodeaux cannot visit his history teacher’s office because it is located on the second floor of elevator-less Johnston Hall.
“I’ve had to have some classes changed because certain buildings weren’t accessible,” Thibodeaux says.
Just the same, Thibodeaux admittedly knows little about the intricacies of the ADA codes and regulations. He leaves that to guys such as Neal Norton, an architect for Jerry M. Campbell. In his downtown office, Norton has three separate manuals that focus on ADA guidelines, each a couple of inches thick.
The ADA code, Norton says, “is the law of the land.”
Norton’s firm is designing the renovation of the Journalism School, a project that got off the ground this summer. The first step, Norton says, was the program analysis. Next comes the price estimate, followed by preliminary drawings.
This is where the Office of Disability Services comes in. After the layout of an on-campus building is reviewed by Facility Planning, Assistant Director for Disability Services Benjamin Cornwell gives the drawings a look. If he notices aspects of the design that are incompliant, he notifies the architect.
The buildings are invariably drawn up to meet the ADA requirements. Meeting ADA recommendations, however, is another story entirely.
The ADA regulations cite minimums that are essential for compliancy. But, within the regulations also lie recommendations, access guidelines rarely present in some layouts.
For example, maneuver clearance, the space between the wall and the door frame, must meet the 18-inch requirement to be compliant. The recommendation, however, calls for 24 inches.
“We try and be as generous as we can with it,” Norton says, “but when it gets down to tight spaces and we don’t have the luxury of space, we won’t do it. In a remodeling job in particular, it’s tough to do that.”
The Journalism Building, the oldest building on the LSU campus, is deemed a historical landmark by state law and, thus, never was forced to meet ADA requirements. But in the case of a major renovation — the state fire marshal decides what is and isn’t a major renovation, mainly based on the price of the project — the code is enforced.
When the makeover of the Journalism Building is complete, an elevator will be installed adjacent to the lobby of the two-story building. In addition, two ramps within brick-wall structures will lead to the first floor, and an area of rescue assistance will be in place on the second floor.
More detailed guidelines, the ones students without disabilities never may notice, also must be met. From the space surrounding telephones (at least 30 inches by 48 inches) to the height of thresholds at doorways (no taller than 3/4 inch), the ADA regulations touch every aspect of building design.
The regulations “are extensive,” Norton says, “and they cover basically everything.”