Freedom´s Tools

THE COST OF "ACCESSIBLE"

Why don’t they do it?

by D. Allan Roberts

Also read Housing Double Whammy - Low Income and Disabled

Hundreds of books and articles have been written about how to make a house friendlier to people with disabilities, and especially those confined to a wheelchair. Why is it, then, that after over 20 years of education, so few builders actually incorporate accessibility features into their new homes?

It is very likely that the primary reason is simply inertia. Why mess with plans that sell well? But you would think that at least some builders would see this as a market to be exploited. Judging by my sampling of the thousands of plans available from builders, in magazines, on CD’s, and on the web, they do not. Is it possible that they feel they would have to pay too high a price for the changes?

I believe that this is true, but the price is not in dollars. A well-designed accessible home (using the “Universal Design” guidelines) should cost little more than an equivalent home of similar size. No, the currency that they are not willing to part with is area: square footage that would have to be moved around for accessibility.

When boiled down to its floor plan essence, accessibility really only means two things: wider hallways and bigger bathrooms. There are many other details, of course (ramps, lever handles, knee spaces, switches …), but halls and baths are the two that move walls around. Let’s see how much moving there is in a real situation.

I recently decided to build a new house according to the following rules:

1. Start with an existing floor plan.
2. Modify it as little as possible.
3. Make the home as accessible as is humanly possible.
4. Keep the excess cost to an absolute minimum.

The plan chosen is a 1650 square foot three bedroom, two bath ranch, to which I added a garage and a porch. The results exceeded my expectations. Except for the ramp up to the porch, the house looks totally “normal” but is completely wheelchair-friendly! The original plan is shown as Figure 1, and the revised plan is Figure 2.

There are several very important things to notice about these plans:

1. They look very similar.
2. The new hall is six inches wider than the old one.
3. Both bathrooms are bigger.
4. The master bath had to move to get bigger.
5. The guest bath and utility room moved to replace the master bath.
6. Bedroom #2 is no longer on the corner of the house.
7. The small stub hallway is gone.
8. The linen closet and pantry are new.

Table 1 shows the comparative room areas. Immediately apparent (partly because I highlighted them in red) are the added pantry, the increases in bathroom sizes, and the corresponding decreases in the two guest bedrooms and the living room. All of the other changes are minor by comparison. I believe these three room size reductions, plus the moving of Bedroom #2 from its prime corner location, are the keys to the foot-dragging that we are witnessing. Unfortunately, there seems to be no way around the problem, because the bathrooms must be larger to allow for both a five-foot turn circle and good access to the sides of the toilet.

There are many other Universal Design features in this new house, some of them rather subtle, including:

1. Bedroom and bathroom doors are 36-inches wide.
2. The hall is straight, with fewer required turns.
3. Bifold doors on closets make wheelchair access easier.
4. The master bath has a bifold door for safety.
5. The master bath has a special design roll-in shower.
6. The hot water tank is in the center of the house, nearer the bathrooms.
7. Most doors have 18-inches free wall space on the latch side for easier opening from a wheelchair.
8. The master closet has high and low hanging rails on the two sides.
9. Both bathrooms have big-button telephones near the toilets for emergencies.
10. Shutoff valves in the utility room are positioned so that they are easy to reach from a wheelchair.

Because of relatively new tools like the "jaws of life," many people (including two of my neighbor’s children) who would have died are alive but wheelchair-bound. Because of the many improvements in medical care, more and more people are living into their 80s and beyond, with a significant percentage of them needing mobility help. In the very near future we are going to become desperate for accessible housing that does not presently exist. How do we break through this barrier and get builders making homes closer to the "Universal Design" standards?

The answer must be publicity by organizations such as AARP. Find those builders who make homes accessible and promote them as much as possible. Write articles about them, with pictures showing what they have done right. In those same articles, show corresponding pictures of what happens when you do things wrong. Let the public see what they need to demand from builders. Even, to the extent that is legally possible, try to embarrass those who make spurious claims of accessibility when all they have done is move the toilet, widen a hall, or add a ramp.

The disability and aging communities need to get together and start motivating builders now. It takes a long time to get homes on the market, and we are already getting a very late start.

Note: The house shown has been constructed (near Hendersonville, NC) and is currently for sale. Contact Betsy Smith, Century 21 Mountain Lifestyles, 828-884-6873.