Tufts campus has never been easy to traverse on an icy winter day, as it sits on a hill. But if the trek up Walnut Hill seems onerous on foot, imagine what it would be like for one of the 21.2 million Americans the U.S. Census Bureau lists as having physical disabilities that limit basic activities such as walking or climbing stairs.
Though campus geography is "known to be difficult for folks with mobility impairment to navigate," according to Christy Galatis, an Equal Opportunity Specialist in the Office of Institutional Diversity, Tufts is looking to improve its accessibility to students with physical disabilities as it plans and executes this year's construction efforts.
"The projects we're doing now are increasing accessibility and helping accessibility," Director of University Facilities Bob Bertram said. "Buildings like Sophia Gordon Hall and the new music building, which will be opening in January, are completely accessible."
Under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, all new building projects are required to meet specific technical requirements for accessibility, which designate hallway and doorway dimensions, bathroom accessibility guidelines and other provisions. According to Bertram, Massachusetts regulations are particularly strong due to the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board requirements in statewide building code.
As a result, the new construction efforts are particularly accommodating to the disabled.
"The first things we ask are 'Can we get into the building in an accessible manner? Is there a water fountain on the way? Are the bathrooms accessible?'" said Director of Construction Management Mitch Bodnarchuk, who oversees many of the on-campus projects.
According to Bodnarchuk, buildings that exceed $100,000 or projects that exceed 30 percent of a building's value, such as Sophia Gordon Hall, the new music building and the Fletcher Hall renovations, have the highest accessibility standards. As a result, the construction has included major provisions for disability access improvements.
"In Fletcher, for example, we went in and installed an elevator," Bodnarchuk said. "We addressed a multitude of issues on all the floors related to the bathrooms, stair hand rails, door hardware sizes, accessibility to the auditoriums and of course changes in levels between some of the floors."
And with Sophia Gordon Hall, Bodnarchuk said, the improvements were about more than just the building.
"In doing [the Sophia Gordon Hall construction] we really looked at pedestrian flow from upper to lower campus," Bodnarchuk said. "As part of the building project, we really looked at how people move north to south across campus, even though that's not something that's required by code."
Taking into account the accessibility challenge inherent in the campus' geography, Bodnarchuk said the construction plans looked toward building a bridge between the uphill and downhill sections of campus.
"We included in the Sophia Gordon project a handicapped-accessible pathway from Professors Row to Sophia Gordon, and then provided a lift for anyone with a disability so they could go down to the lower level and then access Talbot Avenue," Bodnarchuk said. "We knew that was an important aspect to consider going forward on that project. It wasn't required in the code, but we thought it was a good thing to do."
But while the new construction efforts are a start, Bertram said there's still work to be done.
"There are buildings and there certainly are areas on campus that are
inaccessible to people in wheel chairs. There's no question about it," Bertram said. "There's a huge difference in the level of accessibility because of the law and because of the way we build buildings today."
Bertram cited Packard Hall as an example of older construction. "It's 200 years old, and a wheelchair can't even get into the front door," he said.
Bertram explained that, to help improve conditions, part of every construction or renovation project includes changes in accessibility. In buildings where no projects are scheduled, the university occasionally uses its scarce resources for "standalone" projects whose "sole purpose is to improve the level of disability access in the building," he said.
"Of course, that obviously requires a whole bunch of money," Bertram added.
According to Galatis, finding that money is not always easy.
"In terms of the access issues, when a student is accepted and needs some sort of barrier removed or physical accommodation, that has always been a challenge," she said. "There has always been a challenge for resources and most of [the University's] time is put into making sure the academic adjustments happen. When a physical issue comes into play they really do need a lot of support."
Still, Bertram said, ultimately Tufts will do its best to deal with any accessibility issue it encounters. "If we have a handicapped student who has a particular need to get into a particular building because of a class schedule or something, and that building is not accessible, then we'll go out and we'll fix that building, whether it's major or minor in terms of spending," he said. "Most standalone projects can run in the tens of thousands."
Galatis agreed that "there are plenty of students who have had accommodation requests for physical access who have been very happy here," but said the process for receiving those accommodations involves all parts of Tufts bureaucracy.
"When there's a request for accommodations, sometimes they may call Health Services, OEO [Office of Equal Opportunity], or Facilities, depending on the request," Galatis said. "Historically, the process has been decentralized."
As a result, she said, the system for receiving accommodations lacks consistency. "With anything, it's better to have a process and a service centralized rather than decentralized," she said. "You don't want one person doing it in Fletcher differently than they're doing it over in Arts and Sciences."
According to Galatis, to help organize the process, the Office of Equal Opportunity will be acquiring an Executive Director of Diversity next year who "will be asked to include disability within their diversity efforts," in terms of "training, outreach, recruitment," Galatis said. The director will report directly to President Bacow on campus diversity issues.
"That means figuring out how we will do better with disability access on campus," Galatis said.
Though there is still work to do, Bodnarchuk said it's important that the university is aware of the issue and looking to improve.
"This is something that's always on our minds. We go through that process as we do all of our projects," Bodnarchuk said. "We do the right thing when we have the opportunity to do it."
