Everyone has his own set of pet peeves and one of mine is found when entering grocery stores, retail outlets, pharmacies and restaurants.
They are called detectable warning pavers, better known as those damn yellow bumpy things. With a family of five, an overflowing grocery cart is inevitable – so one must navigate through those rattle traps with extra caution, or else groceries will certainly take a tumble.
Let’s just say that these detectable warning pavers are not very “grocery cart friendly” and over the years they have been responsible for the destruction of thousands if not millions of gallons of milk, cartons of eggs, and jars filled with pickles, salsa, and jelly.
When pushing a cart of groceries over theses truncated domes I sometimes wonder just how hard it is for someone in a wheelchair to navigate through them.
Many of us have cursed these teeth rattling mine-fields while wondering what genius thought placing them in front of a grocery store was a good idea.
But have you ever questioned exactly the purpose behind these raised bumps?
As a safety and risk management consultant who has worked with a couple of grocery store chains over the years, my very first guess was that they were designed to stop runaway grocery carts or baby strollers from rolling out into traffic. Now that would make sense, right? Then I began noticing those bumps popping up on many sidewalks that met the corner of intersections and eventually connected the dots.
It turns out that detectable warning paving was designed as a form of markers, also called truncate domes or tactical pavers. These ground surface indicators are designed to help people with a visual impairment determine the boundary between a sidewalk and a street, where there is no curb to warn them.
These detectable warnings are a distinctive surface pattern of domes detectable by cane or underfoot to alert people with vision impairments of their approach to street crossings and hazardous unprotected drop-offs near train stations. They are used to indicate the boundary between pedestrian and vehicular routes where there is a flush instead of a curbed connection.
The original tactile paving was developed by Seiichi Miyake in 1965. The paving was first introduced in a street in Okayama city, Japan, in 1967. Its use gradually spread throughout Japan and eventually around the world.
The United States picked up their use in the early 1990s, after passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), which originally required detectable warnings for curb ramps (that is, ramps where the curb is cut) and for the edges of railway platforms in the United States. In 2010 the ADA Design Standards were revised to leave out the requirement for detectable warnings on curb ramps precisely because they were a hazard in some cases, but government agencies and businesses unfamiliar with the change continue to install them.
In the beginning, most of the detectable warning pavers were yellow. The color has since sometimes changed to match the pavement surface.
The Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines (ADAAG) added some formality to the use and design of these detectable warning pavers in July 2001 by adding formality in the size, design, and distance between each dome and location for these detectable warnings pavers, — spawning a new multi-million dollar industry which created hundreds, if not thousands of jobs nationwide that are still thriving today.
With the improvement the slip, trip and fall hazard from these detectable warning pavers diminished somewhat.
However because these domes are elevated they still serve as a hazard as I have seen first-hand able bodied women in high heels fall and twist an ankle and I have even witnessed my own kid catch a flip-flop on one of the raised bumps causing a skinned knee.
The greater concern is that these raised mini-domes are terribly unsafe for unstable for elderly people, especially those that walk with walkers and canes. Over the years many have lost their balance and have fallen resulting in broken hips, arms, and collar bones.
The fact is even everyday pedestrians as well as the visually impaired still find these detectable warning pavers to be controversial from a safety perspective, because the raised bumps make it very difficult for the mobility impaired. Those who use manual wheelchairs secretly complain. bu nobody wants to come across as insensitive to the visually impaired.
The issue is that people in wheelchairs need to use momentum to push themselves up and down the curb ramp but sometimes the dots are just too bumpy. The bumps could potentially stop a wheelchair dead in its tracks. For those with spinal cord injuries, these truncated domes have also been known to trigger muscle spasms.
Of course, we should provide accommodations for the needs of all people with disabilities.
This is a classic example of the law of unintended consequences. Sometimes, one solution may create another problem.
I am not an engineer by trade, but I have stayed at a few Holiday Inns and I believe that the Department of Justice which oversees the ADA laws needs to seriously consider redesigning these detectable warning pavers.
I would suggest leaving out sections of the truncated domes and construct them with wide enough gaps built into the design for wheelchairs, strollers and even my grocery cart to fit through.
This small change can make a huge difference in improving the safety of people with mobility impairments, and will help get my groceries home safely.
Be Safe My Friends
Keven Moore works in risk management services. He has a bachelor’s degree from University of Kentucky, a master’s from Eastern Kentucky University and 25-plus years of experience in the safety and insurance profession. He lives in Lexington with his family and works out of both the Lexington and Northern Kentucky offices. Keven can be reached at kmoore@roeding.com.