True from the 504 regs in the 70's....
The news is bleak. Federal agencies charged with enforcing the ADA and other disability rights laws do important work to protect the rights of disabled people. But those same agencies fall woefully short when it comes to issuing federal regulations. The status of disability rights regulations boils down to a five-letter word: Delay.
Federal agencies announced delay in regulations in a wide range of areas, from accessible websites and safe sidewalks to movie theater captioning and accessible federal technology purchases. Instead of long overdue action in these critical programs, all the feds offered was delay, delay, and more delay.
Fortunately, advocates — both in and out of the federal government, industry and higher education — are not waiting for regulations to make the promise of the ADA a reality.
Safe Sidewalks: 17 years, No Regulations
In 1999 a little known federal agency called the United States Access Board had a good idea. Nine years after passages of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), the Board issued an official notice of its “intent to establish a Public Rights-of-Way Access Advisory Committee.” The committee’s job was to make recommendations for accessibility guidelines for public rights-of-way covered by the ADA.
Public Rights-of-Way are streets, sidewalks, pedestrian crosswalks and signals. Accessibility issues include curb cuts, barrier-free sidewalks and detectable warnings (those yellow bumpy strips that help a blind person distinguish the street from the sidewalk). Crossing signals that give audible and tactile versions of the standard “walk/don’t walk” visual signals are also part of making the public right of way accessible.