When it comes to the fight for mass transit for people with disabilities, United Spinal has always been a leading participant.
By James J. Weisman
In a ceremony at Grand Central Terminal, New York Gov. Mario Cuomo signs a settlement agreement outlining specific steps to make New York City’s transportation system more accessible to people with disabilities. To Cuomo’s left is James J. Peters, executive director of Eastern Paralyzed Veterans Association, which is now United Spinal.
After successfully pushing to make all New York City buses wheelchair accessible, United Spinal has hosted frequent transit trainings to familiarize bus operators and passengers who use wheelchairs with the equipment and boarding procedures.
During the 1970s, United Spinal Association began actively advocating for access to mass transit vehicles and facilities. By 1979, as New York City-based Eastern Paralyzed Veterans Association, we had sued the Metropolitan Transportation Authority of New York City to force the agency to buy accessible buses when they bought new ones and make subway stations accessible as they renovated them.
After five and a half years of litigation-in the face of opposition from almost every elected official and every media editorial board, and with the support of all New Yorkers with disabilities and Governor Mario Cuomo-United Spinal was able to settle the litigation in a historic fashion. We got key subway stations to be made accessible, new buses to be accessible and a paratransit system to be created to provide transportation for those who were unable to use an accessible mass transit system.
We brought a similar suit in Philadelphia with similar results and became part of a great national movement.
Access Goes National
The next few years we went to Washington to draft key provisions of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) and then lobbied for its passage. The transportation provisions of the Act were based on our settlement agreements in Philadelphia and New York City, the two oldest, largest rail cities in the United States. It was obvious to Congress that if these two systems could make themselves accessible, so could the other old rail cities, such as Chicago and Boston. United Spinal was there, drafting the
U.S. Department of Transportation’s ADA implementing regulations, which instructed transit operators on how to provide services to people with disabilities in a non-discriminatory manner and creating minimum operating criteria for paratransit systems nationwide. During the past 30 years, United Spinal has witnessed a great transition, from a time when no buses or trains were accessible to a time when inaccessibility of mass transit vehicles is the exception to the rule and usually unlawful.
During the early years, when lift-equipped buses began arriving in cities all over the country, drivers refused or didn’t know how to operate the lifts. Lifts were frequently broken, but the buses were not taken out of service to repair the equipment and people with disabilities had to be intrepid to gain access.
Bus Buddies
A culture developed around wheelchair users who used mass transit. They were tough, they were trend-setters, they were out there. United Spinal created a “bus buddy” system in New York City and Philadelphia which was replicated all over the country. Wheelchair-using bus riders volunteered to accompany new bus riders who needed to use lift equipment to eliminate the fear factor.
Mayor Ed Koch of New York City, an outspoken opponent of accessibility to mass transit (not because he was anti-disabled, but because he thought people with disabilities would never use mass transit and it would be a waste of money), predicted that New Yorkers would resent people with disabilities because buses would take longer to board if wheelchair users were using the lifts. Instead, busloads of New Yorkers, would break into spontaneous applause when people with disabilities used the lift. “It’s good to see the City finally doing something for somebody,” they’d say.
Making paratransit work effectively, on the other hand, has been a knotty problem. When United Spinal sued to gain access to mass transit, it wasn’t to create paratransit, but paratransit seemed a necessary and logical result of our advocacy efforts. There will always be a portion of the population that can’t use accessible mass transit, either because of lack of stamina, cognitive impairment, or what have you.
Making paratransit provide effective demand/response service is difficult, because the better the service gets, the more people request it. Nevertheless, United Spinal’s been there advocating for people who need paratransit to have effective service, as well as instructing those who don’t need it, but just want it to take the bus or the train. We pushed transit operators nationwide to view paratransit as part of the mass transit system, feeding paratransit users to mass transit when the problem is the inability to get to an accessible station. This makes paratransit cheaper to provide and makes mass transit users out of those who would use the limited paratransit resource as a sole source of transportation, perhaps depriving another of a ride.
What’s Left?
At United Spinal, we are proud of what we have accomplished. We have changed the nature of mass transportation. It used to serve only those without disabilities, and now, because we worked in concert with people with disabilities all over the United States, mass transit is accessible. Congress acknowledged what we accomplished and mandated that the rest of the nation follow suit. On July 26, 1990, President George H.W. Bush made it the law of the land.
What’s left to do? Well, key stations were all we could get when mass transit was completely inaccessible. Now we have to go back and get every station. There is no reason in the world why people with disabilities should have less access than people without disabilities. Right now, the ADA requires that as stations are renovated in the ordinary course of business, they be made accessible if accessibility can be accomplished for 20% of the cost of renovations. Eventually, all stations will be renovated, however, the 20% cap prevents elevator installations at many locations. This is the next big hurdle. We must get government to finish the job.
James J. Weisman, senior vice president of Public Policy, was one of the authors of the transportation sections of the Americans with Disabilities Act and a former member of the Access Board during the Clinton Administration.
