Fairhope, Alabama
 |
| Stadium home (west ) side. |
HOME SIDE ONLY
Work has begun to bring the home side of WC Majors Field into compliance with the Americans With Disabilities Act; some stairs have been removed and are to be replaced with a series of ramps and viewing levels for handicapped individuals, according to project description documents.
The city is doing some of the demolition work; Kahlbau Construction is the primary contractor, not to exceed $138.5K.
Comments
My mother was confined to a wheelchair, and I have suffered with a crippling, degenerative disease for most of my life, and I can access the facility and enjoy the games right now. Is it unfair if cannot sit wherever I please? No, that's life.
I do not wish for or approve of an overweening federal government imposing--in my name--exorbitant costs upon my community, raising the taxes/cost of living for my neighbors, and assuming that it knows better what we need than we do.
The ADA is an out-of-control monster--costing businesses (i.e. consumers) billions each year and spawning hundreds of millions in frivolous, punitive litigation.
I don't blame Fairhope for complying, but I will not stand and applaud the diminution of our liberty.
My first surprise was in seeing that the library only has TWO conforming parking spaces for a wheelchair user. The ones on the side street lack a curb cut, place the user in traffic, and requires that you ride up the driveway as the only ramp. This is both too steep as well as putting you in traffic.
My next surprise was R Bistro. I really wanted to try this place but there is a step into the building. The ADA depends on city building departments to police this by not granting occupancy until a business is compliant. Not only is there a step but the tables on the sidewalk do not allow room for a wheelchair to use the sidewalk . Making matters worse there is a curb which forces me to bypass the Bistro in the traffic of the street.
This trend of favoring the business over the handicapped can be seen at several other business downtown.
As for progressives, freedom seems to them as situational as their ethics.
San Francisco is also by a bay, and they are awesomely compliant with the ADA--and thousands of other rules and regulations federal, state, and local. Quite a utopia, eh?