Cleveland, OH The American Association of Automatic Door Manufacturers (AAADM) have began to publicly support the work of the U.S. Access Board, whose tagline is “Advancing full access and inclusion for all.” The Access Board is an independent federal agency that promotes equality for people with disabilities through leadership in accessible design and the development of accessibility guidelines and standards. First created in 1973 to ensure access to federally funded facilities, the Access Board is now a leading source of information on accessible design.
Accessible building design is obviously a far-reaching subject, and automatic doors play a vital role in advancing these goals. For this reason, the Government Affairs Committee of AAADM is heavily involved in supporting the work and mission of the Access Board. That mission is to develop accessibility guidelines and standards so that people with disabilities can live independently when it comes to physical (and online) access.
For more than 25 years, Scott Windley, technical assistance coordinator at the Access Board, has worked to help people with disabilities achieve independence in accessing physical spaces. “There is nothing worse than being in a wheelchair and being out in the weather and not being able to get the door open,” said Windley, a wheelchair user himself.
Windley reminds everyone that people with disabilities are not a homogenous group. “Everyone has different abilities as far as accessibility is concerned. The thing about an automatic door is that whether I have the use of my arms or not, if I can push a button or activate a sensor, I can get that door open.”
Windley believes the key to improving accessibility for all people is to engage more with people with disabilities, discuss how the industry can improve, and then get involved with ANSI (American National Standards Institute) and contribute to its work on the ICC A117.1, the standard for accessibility requirements that is referenced in the International Building Code (IBC).
The intent of the standard is to allow a person with a physical disability to independently get to, enter, and use a site, facility, building, or element regardless of inability to walk, difficulty walking, reliance on walking aids, blindness and visual impairment, deafness and hearing impairment, incoordination, reaching and manipulation disabilities, lack of stamina, difficulty in interpreting and reacting to sensory information, and extremes in physical size.
In 2021, AAADM played a critical role in securing an accessibility victory with an update to IBC 1105.1.1. It now stipulates that, in facilities meeting building occupant load thresholds for a number of common occupancies, public entrances that are required to be accessible shall have one door be either a full power-operated door or a low-energy power-operated door.
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