Thinking ahead on accessibility

In many ways, state Sen. Dan McConchie’s proposal to require new electric-vehicle charging stations to be accessible to disabled drivers is one of those legislative measures that would seem destined to slide easily through the General Assembly and into law.

Drivers with disabilities already have accessibility options at traditional gasoline filling stations, and obviously their needs must be taken into account if the state is to build the infrastructure to handle its ambitious goals for increasing the number of EVs on the road.

But a larger question also seems to deserve some attention: How did it come to pass that accessibility alternatives weren’t required when the existing charging stations were put in operation?

McConchie, a Hawthorn Woods Republican, was generous in his reflection on that question for a story by our Jenny Whidden this week.

“This is what happens with new technology,” he said. “Something new comes up, you can’t think of every eventuality as you’re starting, and as it begins to really take hold and progress, we begin to see some of the issues and begin to fine tune. It’s not unusual that this has occurred, but it does look like we’re going to be a leader on this issue as far as this rollout across the country and I’m just excited at the prospect of Illinois being one of the first states to really, I think, do this right.”

At least insofar as it involves disability standards, the most troubling phrase in that analysis is, “It’s not unusual that this has occurred.”

If that is true, it would seem that our institutions and our businesses are not as sensitized toward the needs of people with disabilities as we may like to think. With whole industries cropping up to help businesses and government comply with federal Americans for Disabilities Act requirements, we may be fooled into thinking that we’re fully aware of building accessibility into all our endeavors.

That McConchie’s bill is needed for such a relatively routine new function — and it truly is needed — is evidence of just how limited that thinking may be.

It’s worth noting that the legislation makes no demands on existing stations. McConchie expressed the “hope” that existing operations will take steps to adapt.

That is a start, to be sure, but there’s also something somewhat appropriately forewarning in his further expectation that “at some point I do suspect that there will be some retroactivity down the road, even if it's not immediate.”

If the lack of standards in a situation like this is properly judged an oversight, keep in mind that Illinois is not singularly culpable. Only California and Colorado have similar standards so far.

McConchie’s bill has some distance to go before it becomes law. It unanimously cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee in March, and next must go to the full Senate, possibly today, followed by action in the House before moving to the governor for his signature. Hopefully, it will pass through the system smoothly.

And, hopefully too, the experience can serve as a reminder that disability access should be built into the planning and development of any new operations in any field of endeavor open to the general public — before the need is discovered by disabled individuals who seek to make use of them.