Sidewalks Become Battlegrounds

Oct. 26, 2009 -- JACKSON, Miss. — The nation's crumbling sidewalks have disabled residents taking their wheelchairs to the streets, a potentially dangerous practice that has cash-strapped cities and disability-rights advocates at odds over how to fix the problem.

Cities across the nation are dealing with eroding sidewalks that do not meet standards set by the Americans with Disabilities Act. Under the ADA, state and local governments cannot discriminate against the disabled in providing "services, programs or activities," including access to sidewalks.

Although there are no specific statistics on the number of accidents involving wheelchairs in streets, according to the U.S. Department of Transportation's Fatality Analysis Reporting System, disability was a factor in 617 pedestrian traffic fatalities last year.

Disabled residents here take their lives in their hands getting from point A to point B, says Scott Crawford, a disability-rights advocate.

In March, James Smith, 68, was killed when an SUV, struck by another vehicle, plowed into his motorized wheelchair on Medgar Evers Boulevard, one of Jackson's main thoroughfares.

Where they exist, the sidewalks often are in such disrepair as to be impassible to people in wheelchairs, says Crawford, leaving the roadway as the only other option.

"I've been beeped at and honked at and cussed at," by motorists, he says.

Lois Thibault, coordinator of research for the U.S. Access Board, a federal agency that provides guidance to local governments on ADA issues, said Jackson is in the same boat with a lot of cities that for years stalled spending federal dollars on sidewalks to spend money on roads.

"It's deferred maintenance," she said. "We've been so focused on new construction that we've let the maintenance go."

Crawford is a plaintiff in a federal lawsuit aimed at getting the city to comply with ADA standards by making sidewalks, bus stops and other public areas accessible to the disabled. The Justice Department has joined in the lawsuit.