49 CFR Parts 37 & 38 - Department of Transportation (DOT) ADA Regulations

Subpart G—Provision of Service

Section 37.161 Maintenance of Accessible Features--General

This section applies to all entities providing transportation services, public and private. It requires those entities to maintain in operative condition those features or facilities and equipment that make facilities and vehicles accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities.

The ADA requires that, to the maximum extent feasible, facilities be accessible to and usable by individuals with disabilities. This section recognizes that it is not sufficient to provide features such as lift-equipped vehicles, elevators, communications systems to provide information to people with vision or hearing impairments, etc. if these features are not maintained in a manner that enables individuals with disabilities to use them. Inoperative lifts or elevators, locked accessible doors, accessible paths of travel that are blocked by equipment or boxes of materials are not accessible to or usable by individuals with disabilities.

The rule points out that temporary obstructions or isolated instances of mechanical failure would not be considered violations of the ADA or this rule. Repairs must be made “promptly.” The rule does not, and probably could not, state a time limit for making particular repairs, given the variety of circumstances involved. However, repairing accessible features must be made a high priority. Allowing obstructions or out of order accessibility equipment to persist beyond a reasonable period of time would violate this Part, as would mechanical failures due to improper or inadequate maintenance. Failure of the entity to ensure that accessible routes are free of obstruction and properly maintained, or failure to arrange prompt repair of inoperative elevators, lifts, or other accessibility-related equipment, would also violate this part.

The rule also requires that accommodations be made to individuals with disabilities who would otherwise use an inoperative accessibility feature. For example, when a rail system discovers that an elevator is out of order, blocking access to one of its stations, it could accommodate users of the station by announcing the problem at other stations to alert passengers and offer accessible shuttle bus service around the temporarily inaccessible station. If a public address system were out of order, the entity could designate personnel to provide information to customers with visual impairments.

Section 37.163 Keeping Vehicle Lifts in Operative Condition--Public Entities

This section applies only to public entities. Of course, like vehicle acquisition requirements and other provisions applying to public entities, these requirements also apply when private entities “stand in the shoes” of public entities in contracting situations, as provided in §37.23.

This section's first requirement is that the entity establish a system of regular and frequent maintenance checks of lifts sufficient to determine if they are operative.

Vehicle and equipment maintenance is an important component of successful accessible service. In particular, an aggressive preventive maintenance program for lifts is essential. Lifts remain rather delicate pieces of machinery, with many moving parts, which often must operate in a harsh environment of potholes, dust and gravel, variations in temperature, snow, slush, and deicing compounds. It is not surprising that they sometimes break down.

The point of a preventive maintenance program is to prevent breakdowns, of course. But it is also important to catch broken lifts as soon as possible, so that they can be repaired promptly. Especially in a bus system with relatively low lift usage, it is possible that a vehicle could go for a number of days without carrying a passenger who uses the lift. It is highly undesirable for the next passenger who needs a lift to be the person who discovers that the lift is broken, when a maintenance check by the operator could have discovered the problem days earlier, resulting in its repair.

Therefore, the entity must have a system for regular and frequent checks, sufficient to determine if lifts are actually operative. This is not a requirement for the lift daily. (Indeed, it is not, as such, a requirement for lift cycling at all. If there is another means available of checking the lift, it may be used.) If alternate day checks, for example, are sufficient to determine that lifts are actually working, then they are permitted. If a lift is used in service on a given day, that may be sufficient to determine that the lift is operative with respect to the next day. It would be a violation of this part, however, for the entity to neglect to check lifts regularly and frequently, or to exhibit a pattern of lift breakdowns in service resulting in stranded passengers when the lifts had not been checked before the vehicle failed to provide required accessibility to passengers that day.

When a lift breaks down in service, the driver must let the entity know about the problem by the most immediate means available. If the vehicle is equipped with a radio or telephone, the driver must call in the problem on the spot. If not, then the driver would have to make a phone call at the first opportunity (e.g., from a phone booth during the turnaround time at the end of the run). It is not sufficient to wait until the end of the day and report the problem when the vehicle returns to the barn.

When a lift is discovered to be inoperative, either because of an in-service failure or as the result of a maintenance check, the entity must take the vehicle out of service before the beginning of its next service day (with the exception discussed below) and repair the lift before the vehicle is put back into service. In the case of an in-service failure, this means that the vehicle can continue its runs on that day, but cannot start a new service day before the lift is repaired. If a maintenance check in the evening after completion of a day's run or in the morning before a day's runs discloses the problem, then the bus would not go into service until the repair had taken place.

The Department realizes that, in the years before bus fleets are completely accessible, taking buses with lifts out of service for repairs in this way would probably result in an inaccessible spare bus being used on the route, but at least attention would have to be paid quickly to the lift repair, resulting in a quicker return to service of a working accessible bus.

The rule provides an exception for those situations in which there is no spare vehicle (either accessible or inaccessible) available to take the place of the vehicle with an operative lift, such that putting the latter vehicle into the shop would result in a reduction of service to the public (e.g., a scheduled run on a route could not be made). The Department would emphasize that the exception does not apply when there is any spare vehicle available.

Where the exception does apply, the provider may keep the vehicle with the inoperative lift in service for a maximum of three days (for providers operating in an area of over 50,000 population) or five days (for providers operating in an area of 50,000 population or less). After these times have elapsed, the vehicle must go into the shop, not to return until the lift is repaired. Even during the three- or five-day period, if an accessible spare bus becomes available at any time, it must be used in place of the bus with the inoperative lift or an inaccessible spare that is being used in its place.

In a fixed route system, if a bus is operating without a working lift (either on the day when the lift fails in service or as the result of the exception discussed above) and headways between accessible buses on the route on which the vehicle is operating exceed 30 minutes, the entity must accommodate passengers who would otherwise be inconvenienced by the lack of an accessible bus. This accommodation would be by a paratransit or other special vehicle that would pick up passengers with disabilities who cannot use the regular bus because its lift is inoperative. Passengers who need lifts in this situation would, in effect, be ADA paratransit eligible under the second eligibility category. However, since they would have no way of knowing that the bus they sought to catch would not be accessible that day, the transit authority must actively provide alternative service to them. This could be done, for example, by having a “shadow” accessible service available along the route or having the bus driver call in the minute he saw an accessible passenger he could not pick up (including the original passenger stranded by an in-service lift failure), with a short (i.e., less than 30-minute) response from an accessible vehicle dispatched to pick up the stranded passenger. To minimize problems in providing such service, when a transit authority is using the “no spare vehicles” exception, the entity could place the vehicle with the inoperative lift on a route with headways between accessible buses shorter than 30 minutes.

Section 37.165 Lift and Securement Use

This provision applies to both public and private entities.

All people using wheelchairs, as defined in the rule, and other powered mobility devices, under the circumstances provided in the rule, are to be allowed to ride the entity's vehicles.

Entities may require wheelchair users to ride in designated securement locations. That is, the entity is not required to carry wheelchair users whose wheelchairs would have to park in an aisle or other location where they could obstruct other persons' passage or where they could not be secured or restrained. An entity's vehicle is not required to pick up a wheelchair user when the securement locations are full, just as the vehicle may pass by other passengers waiting at the stop if the bus is full.

The entity may require that wheelchair users make use of securement systems for their mobility devices. The entity, in other words, can require wheelchair users to “buckle up” their mobility devices. The entity is required, on a vehicle meeting part 38 standards, to use the securement system to secure wheelchairs as provided in that part. On other vehicles (e.g., existing vehicles with securement systems which do not comply with part 38 standards), the entity must provide and use a securement system to ensure that the mobility device remains within the securement area. This latter requirement is a mandate to use best efforts to restrain or confine the wheelchair to the securement area. The entity does the best it can, given its securement technology and the nature of the wheelchair. The Department encourages entities with relatively less adequate securement systems on their vehicles, where feasible, to retrofit the vehicles with better securement systems, that can successfully restrain a wide variety of wheelchairs. It is our understanding that the cost of doing so is not enormous.

An entity may not, in any case, deny transportation to a wheelchair and its user because the wheelchair cannot be secured or restrained by a vehicle's securement system, to the entity's satisfaction. The same point applies to an OPMD and its user, subject to legitimate safety requirements.

Entities have often recommended or required that a wheelchair user transfer out of his or her own device into a vehicle seat. Under this rule, it is no longer permissible to require such a transfer. The entity may provide information on risks and make a recommendation with respect to transfer, but the final decision on whether to transfer is up to the passenger.

The entity's personnel have an obligation to ensure that a passenger with a disability is able to take advantage of the accessibility and safety features on vehicles. Consequently, the driver or other personnel must provide assistance with the use of lifts, ramps, and securement devices. For example, the driver must deploy the lift properly and safely. If the passenger cannot do so independently, the driver must assist the passenger with using the securement device. On a vehicle which uses a ramp for entry, the driver may have to assist in pushing a manual wheelchair up the ramp (particularly where the ramp slope is relatively steep). All these actions may involve a driver leaving his seat. Even in entities whose drivers traditionally do not leave their seats (e.g., because of labor-management agreements or company rules), this assistance must be provided. This rule overrides any requirements to the contrary.

Wheelchair users, especially those using electric wheelchairs, often have a preference for entering a lift platform and vehicle in a particular direction (e.g., backing on or going on frontwards). Except where the only way of successfully maneuvering a device onto a vehicle or into its securement area or an overriding safety concern (i.e., a direct threat) requires one way of doing this or another, the transit provider should respect the passenger's preference. We note that most electric wheelchairs are usually not equipped with rearview mirrors, and that many persons who use them are not able to rotate their heads sufficiently to see behind. People using canes or walkers and other standees with disabilities who do not use wheelchairs but have difficulty using steps (e.g., an elderly person who can walk on a level surface without use of a mobility aid but cannot raise his or her legs sufficiently to climb bus steps) must also be permitted to use the lift, on request.

A lift conforming to Access Board requirements has a platform measuring at least 30″ × 48″, with a design load of at least 600 pounds (i.e., capable of lifting a wheelchair/occupant combination of up to 600 pounds). Working parts upon which the lift depends for support of the load, such as cables, pulleys, and shafts, must have a safety factor of at least six times the design load; nonworking parts such as the platform, frame, and attachment hardware, which would not be expected to wear, must have a safety factor of at least three times the design load.

If a transportation provider has a vehicle and equipment that meets or exceeds standards based on Access Board guidelines, and the vehicle and equipment can in fact safely accommodate a given wheelchair, then it is not appropriate, under disability nondiscrimination law, for the transportation provider to refuse to transport the device and its user. Transportation providers must carry a wheelchair and its user, as long as the lift can accommodate the size and weight of the wheelchair and its user and there is space for the wheelchair on the vehicle. However, if in fact a lift or vehicle is unable to accommodate the wheelchair and its user, the transportation provider is not required to carry it.

For example, suppose that a bus or paratransit vehicle lift will safely accommodate an 800-pound wheelchair/passenger combination, but not a combination exceeding 800 pounds (i.e., a design load of 800 lbs.). The lift is one that exceeds the part 38 design standard, which requires lifts to be able to accommodate a 600-pound wheelchair/passenger combination. The transportation provider could limit use of that lift to a combination of 800 pounds or less. Likewise, if a wheelchair or its attachments extends beyond the 30 × 48 inch footprint found in part 38's design standards but fits onto the lift and into the wheelchair securement area of the vehicle, the transportation provider would have to accommodate the wheelchair. However, if such a wheelchair was of a size that would block an aisle and interfere with the safe evacuation of passengers in an emergency, the operator could deny carriage of that wheelchair based on a legitimate safety requirement.

Section 37.167 Other Service Requirements

The requirements in this section apply to both public and private entities.

On fixed route systems, the entity must announce stops. These stops include transfer points with other fixed routes. This means that any time a vehicle is to stop where a passenger can get off and transfer to another bus or rail line (or to another form of transportation, such as commuter rail or ferry), the stop would be announced. The announcement can be made personally by the vehicle operator or can be made by a recording system. If the vehicle is small enough so that the operator can make himself or herself heard without a P.A. system, it is not necessary to use the system.

Announcements also must be made at major intersections or destination points. The rule does not define what major intersections or destination points are. This is a judgmental matter best left to the local planning process. In addition, the entity must make announcements at sufficient intervals along a route to orient a visually impaired passenger to his or her location. The other required announcements may serve this function in many instances, but if there is a long distance between other announcements, fill-in orientation announcements would be called for. The entity must announce any stop requested by a passenger with a disability, even if it does not meet any of the other criteria for announcement.

When vehicles from more than one route serve a given stop or station, the entity must provide a means to assist an individual with a visual impairment or other disability in determining which is the proper vehicle to enter. Some entities have used external speakers. FTA is undertaking a study to determine what is the best available technology in this area. Some transit properties have used colored mitts, or numbered cards, to allow passengers to inform drivers of what route they wanted to use. The idea is to prevent, at a stop where vehicles from a number of routes arrive, a person with a visual impairment from having to ask every driver whether the bus is the right one. The rule does not prescribe what means is to be used, only that some effective means be provided.

Service animals shall always be permitted to accompany their users in any private or public transportation vehicle or facility. One of the most common misunderstandings about service animals is that they are limited to being guide dogs for persons with visual impairments. Dogs are trained to assist people with a wide variety of disabilities, including individuals with hearing and mobility impairments. Other animals (e.g., monkeys) are sometimes used as service animals as well. In any of these situations, the entity must permit the service animal to accompany its user.

Part 38 requires a variety of accessibility equipment. This section requires that the entity use the equipment it has. For example, it would be contrary to this provision for a transit authority to bolt its bus lifts shut because transit authority had difficulty maintaining the lifts. It does little good to have a public address system on a vehicle if the operator does not use it to make announcements (except, as noted above, in the situation where the driver can make himself or herself heard without recourse to amplification.)

Entities must make communications and information available, using accessible formats and technology (e.g., Braille, large print, TDDs) to obtain information about transportation services. Someone cannot adequately use the bus system if schedule and route information is not available in a form he or she can use. If there is only one phone line on which ADA paratransit eligible individuals can reserve trips, and the line is chronically busy, individuals cannot schedule service. Such obstacles to the use of transportation service are contrary to this section. (The latter could, in some circumstances, be viewed as a capacity constraint.)

It is inconsistent with this section for a transit provider to refuse to let a passenger use a lift at any designated stop, unless the lift is physically unable to deploy or the lift would be damaged if it did deploy (see discussion under §37.123). In addition, if a temporary situation at the stop (e.g., construction, an accident, a landslide) made the stop unsafe for anyone to use, the provider could decline to operate the lift there (just as it refused to open the door for other passengers at the same point). The provider could not, however, declare a stop “off limits” to persons with disabilities that is used for other persons. If the transit authority has concerns about barriers or safety hazards that peculiarly affect individuals with disabilities that would use the stop, it should consider making efforts to move the stop.

Under DOT hazardous materials rules, a passenger may bring a portable medical oxygen supply on board a vehicle. Since the hazardous materials rules permit this, transit providers cannot prohibit it. For further information on hazardous materials rules, as they may affect transportation of assistive devices, entities may contact the Department's Research and Special Programs Administration, Office of Hazardous Materials Transportation (202-366-0656).

One concern that has been expressed is that transportation systems (particularly some rail systems) may make it difficult for persons with disabilities to board or disembark from vehicles by very rapidly closing doors on the vehicles before individuals with disabilities (who may move more slowly through crowds in the vehicle or platform than other persons) have a chance to get on or off the vehicle. Doing so is contrary to the rule; operators must make appropriate provision to give individuals with disabilities adequate time to board or disembark.

Section 37.169 Interim Requirements for Over-the-Road Bus Service Operated by Private Entities

Private over-the-road bus (OTRB) service is, first of all, subject to all the other private entity requirements of the rule. The requirements of this section are in addition to the other applicable provisions.

Boarding assistance is required. The Department cannot require any particular boarding assistance devices at this time. Each operator may decide what mode of boarding assistance is appropriate for its operation. We agree with the discussion in the DOJ Title II rule's preamble that carrying is a disfavored method of providing assistance to an individual with a disability. However, since accessible private OTRBs cannot be required by this rule, there may be times when carrying is the only available means of providing access to an OTRB, if the entity does not exercise its discretion to provide an alternative means. It is required by the rule that any employee who provides boarding assistance—above all, who may carry or otherwise directly physically assist a passenger—must be trained to provide this assistance appropriately and safely.

The baggage priority provision for wheelchairs and other assistive devices involves a similar procedure to that established in the Department's Air Carrier Access Act rule (14 CFR part 382). In brief, it provides that, at any given stop, a person with a wheelchair or other assistive device would have the device loaded before other items at this stop. An individual traveling with a wheelchair is not similarly situated to a person traveling with luggage. For the wheelchair user, the wheelchair is an essential mobility device, without which travel is impossible. The rationale of this provision is that, while no one wants his or her items left behind, carrying the wheelchair is more important to its user than ordinary luggage to a traveler. If it comes to an either/or choice (the wheelchair user's luggage would not have any priority over other luggage, however). There would be no requirement, under this provision, for “bumping” baggage already on the bus from previous stops in order to make room for the wheelchair.

The entity could require advance notice from a passenger in only one circumstance. If a passenger needed boarding assistance, the entity could require up to 48 hours' advance notice for the purpose of providing needed assistance. While advance notice requirements are generally undesirable, this appears to be a case in which a needed accommodation may be able to be provided successfully only if the transportation provider knows in advance that some extra staffing is needed to accomplish it. While the primary need for advance notice appears to be in the situation of an unstaffed station, there could be other situations in which advance notice was needed in order to ensure that the accommodation could be made. Entities should not ask for advance notice in all cases, but just in those cases in which it is really needed for this purpose. Even if advance notice is not provided, the entity has the obligation to provide boarding assistance if it can be provided with available staff.

Section 37.171 Equivalency Requirement for Demand Responsive Service Operated by Private Entities Not Primarily in the Business of Transporting People

This provision is a service requirement closely related to the private entity requirements for §§37.101-37.105 of this part. Entities in this category are always required to provide equivalent service, regardless of what they are doing with respect to the acquisition of vehicles. The effect of this provision may be to require some entities to arrange, either through acquiring their own accessible vehicles or coordinating with other providers, to have accessible vehicles available to meet the equivalency standards of §37.105 or otherwise to comply with those standards.

Section 37.173 Training

A well-trained workforce is essential in ensuring that the accessibility-related equipment and accommodations required by the ADA actually result in the delivery of good transportation service to individuals with disabilities. The utility of training was recognized by Congress as well. (See S. Rept. 100-116 at 48.) At the same time, we believe that training should be conducted in an efficient and effective manner, with appropriate flexibility allowed to the organizations that must carry it out. Each transportation provider is to design a training program which suits the needs of its particular operation. While we are confident of this approach, we are mindful that the apparent lack of training has been a source of complaint to FTA and transit providers. Good training is difficult and it is essential.

Several points of this section deserve emphasis. First, the requirements for training apply to private as well as to public providers, of demand responsive as well as of fixed route service. Training is just as necessary for the driver of a taxicab, a hotel shuttle, or a tour bus as it is for a driver in an FTA-funded city bus system.

Second, training must be to proficiency. The Department is not requiring a specific course of training or the submission of a training plan for DOT approval. However, every employee of a transportation provider who is involved with service to persons with disabilities must have been trained so that he or she knows what needs to be done to provide the service in the right way. When it comes to providing service to individuals with disabilities, ignorance is no excuse for failure.

While there is no specific requirement for recurrent or refresher training, there is an obligation to ensure that, at any given time, employees are trained to proficiency. An employee who has forgotten what he was told in past training sessions, so that he or she does not know what needs to be done to serve individuals with disabilities, does not meet the standard of being trained to proficiency.

Third, training must be appropriate to the duties of each employee. A paratransit dispatcher probably must know how to use a TDD and enough about various disabilities to know what sort of vehicle to dispatch. A bus driver must know how to operate lifts and securement devices properly. A mechanic who works on lifts must know how to maintain them. Cross-training, while useful in some instances, is not required, so long as each employee is trained to proficiency in what he or she does with respect to service to individuals with disabilities.

Fourth, the training requirement goes both to technical tasks and human relations. Employees obviously need to know how to run equipment the right way. If an employee will be assisting wheelchair users in transferring from a wheelchair to a vehicle seat, the employee needs training in how to do this safely. But every public contact employee also has to understand the necessity of treating individuals with disabilities courteously and respectfully, and the details of what that involves.

One of the best sources of information on how best to train personnel to interact appropriately with individuals with disabilities is the disability community itself. Consequently, the Department urges entities to consult with disability organizations concerning how to train their personnel. Involving these groups in the process of establishing training programs, in addition to providing useful information, should help to establish or improve working relationships among transit providers and disability groups that, necessarily, will be of long duration. We note that several transit providers use persons with disabilities to provide the actual training. Others have reported that role playing is an effective method to instill an appreciation of the particular perspective of one traveling with a disability.

Finally, one of the important points in training concerns differences among individuals with disabilities. All individuals with disabilities, of course, are not alike. The appropriate ways one deals with persons with various kinds of disabilities (e.g., mobility, vision, hearing, or mental impairments) are likely to differ and, while no one expects bus drivers to be trained as disability specialists, recognizing relevant differences and responding to them appropriately is extremely significant. Public entities who contract with private entities to have service provided—above all, complementary paratransit—are responsible for ensuring that contractor personnel receive the appropriate training.