From: 	"Jason Pica" <jason@portcityarch.com>
To:		"'Jean Fraser'" <JF@portlandmaine.gov>, "'William Savage'" <wsavage@acorn-engineering.com>
CC:		"'Andrew Hyland'" <andy@portcityarch.com>, "'Olivia Dawson'" <odawson@acorn-engineering.com>
Date: 	1/29/2016 10:42 AM
Subject: 	RE: ADA issues RE: Prelim review comments 31 Fore St

Good Morning,  A couple of concerns on the ADA accessibility of the proposed project.  I went to the site this morning and took some pitch measurements of the sidewalks around the site.  On Fore St (The front street of the proposed project) has a pitch of around 1:6, legal ADA accessibility for a pitched slope is 1:12 (with a railing otherwise its 1:20), Technically a person in a wheel chair couldn’t get to any entrance on Fore St based on these guidelines.  The same issue exists on Waterville Street, a 1:8 pitch was measured and is also above the legal requirements.  Unless the city of Portland is planning on re-grading the road, an ADA accessible approach is not possible to this site.   The “Fair Housing Act Design Manual” states on page 14, part one “The Guidelines”, requirement 1 states “

REQUIREMENT 1

Accessible Building Entrance on an Accessible
Route: Covered multifamily dwellings must have
at least one building entrance on an accessible route,
unless it is impractical to do so because of terrain or
unusual characteristics of the site. 
 
With the public sidewalks not meeting ADA accessibility, we believe the bold faced line above applies and the existing sidewalk makes an accessible entrance impractical. With that being said, if/when a Handicapped person comes to visit the building it would have to be by vehicle and they would have to pull up/pull in to the proposed garage, where street level access to the elevator is located.  To alleviate the concerns about the garage being a second class entrance we would change the man door located on Waterville street to a more approachable entrance, A glass door with a canopy above, and a possible buzzer or PA system installed.  We are already in the process of articulating the lower garage level exterior with some windows and a possible material change based on the notes you provided yesterday.  So the garage would be day-lit, heated and also artificially well lit.  Since these condos are meant to be on the higher end, the garage was already planned to be more than just a dark cold space, but a well lit and heated space.  I hope this alleviates some concerns on the ADA accessibility.  Thanks and let me know of any comments on this proposal.

Jason Pica

Senior Architectural Designer
Port City Architecture
(E)  <mailto:jason@portcityarch.com> jason@portcityarch.com
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