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![]() Is the ADA Sign Market For You? Part I Tactile Signs: Letter and Spirit
By Sharon Toji
Where do you stand in the ADA sign business? Sign companies seem to be divided into four categories as far as the ADA goes. One group has been very successful in selling "ADA" (read Braille and raised character) signs. One group was enthusiastic at first, but the market never seemed to develop in their area and they've lost interest. The third group either ignored it from the beginning or has never even heard of it. And the fourth group? They are just now beginning to think about making ADA signs.
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Should your shop be making or selling ADA signs? Is the ADA here to stay? Recent decisions by the Supreme Court that have weakened the law are directed at the equal access to employment section (Title 1). So far, though, the standards for accessible facilities, both privately and publicly owned (Titles 2 and 3), have remained essentially unchallenged by the high court. For the foreseeable future, the ADA is a part of the sign business and every sign company that sells interior signs should, at the very least, think about where these signs fit into its market mix.
If Not, Why Not? Building owners have their own excuses. One is "it doesn't apply to us. We're too small." Or sometimes it's "We never have blind people in here," or "We always escort people." One of the most prevalent about signs is, "But we can't do that, because then the new signs won't match the existing signs." But the law doesn't make any exceptions for those circumstances. There are very few buildings open to the public in the entire country that is exempt from accessibility standards. Even buildings that are exempt from the federal ADA, like religious institutions, may still fall under similar laws passed by individual states. Size doesn't matter either. The tiniest convenience store in the smallest "wide spot in the road" should be made accessible if it is financially and architecturally possible. There are some parts of the country that just don't seem to have heard about the ADA yet. Your state may not have passed its own accessibility codes, except perhaps for parking spots, or maybe you live in a rural area without a strong building inspection system. Let's face it. Unless you want to go door to door to sell the federal law to your customers, you won't be doing much in the way of ADA signs. In some states, however, there is quite a bit of activity and customers may be at your door asking for ADA signs.
Getting Started It's not hard to find a summary of the ADA sign rules, or even the complete text. Both the Department of Justice and the Access Board have the ADA Accessibility Guidelines on their websites. If all you need is a few signs for a customer, maybe a couple of restrooms and a few offices and you care only about meeting the minimum requirements, you'll probably be OK:
If you do that, then you will have followed all the rules for identifying rooms and spaces. Of course there are rules for "visual" signs as well, and additional rules for signs with special symbols that identify accessible features of the facility like phones for people who are deaf. Those rules are pretty simple, however, and making signs according to them doesn't take any special equipment or software. Getting back to the tactile signs, however, since the rules do seem fairly straightforward, and assuming your state doesn't ask for anything beyond the minimum federal standards, what's all the fuss about? - - - continued below - - -
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The Letter and the Spirit: Best Practices After ten years, however, we have enough feedback that we can help sign companies with some advice that will improve the quality of tactile signs. First, it's important that each character and each Braille dot be distinct, with space between each one and its neighbor. Tactile characters need a minimum of 1/8 inch between the two closest points of adjacent numbers or letters. Second, characters need to be conventional sans serif styles (no italics, extended or condensed styles) with thin strokes and preferably with beveled or rounded profiles rather than straight up and down sides. Braille dots need to be rounded or domed rather than flat on top with straight sides. Braille is preferred below the tactile characters, flush left or centered, and with enough space between all lines of copy so that the fingers feel just one raised element at a time. Artwork preparation depends on the fabrication method. For instance, etched signs may need artwork with Braille dots that look like mere pinheads, and with character strokes that are very slender. The etching and developing process will create a rounded Braille dot and a shoulder on all the characters that will make them easy to read. If characters are routed out, however, the artwork will produce the character base size, and the routing or engraving tool will create the bevel. Braille dot size will also differ depending on the method to be used with the router or engraver. Sending your first tactile signs out to a wholesale fabricator will give you a chance to research the several available methods for making tactile signs in order to find the right fit for both your shop and your clients. Following the minimal standards to fulfill the letter of the law, and combining them with "best practices" so that the spirit of the law is achieved, whether you order signs or make them in house, will help you sell a few signs to identify restrooms and offices or rooms. You still will not, however, be producing "ADA sign systems" in the truest sense. Why? Because the ADA signage standards go beyond Braille and raised characters. And they go beyond the signs themselves and enter the world of "Way finding," so selection of sign text, pictogram use, sign size and placement are important. All kinds of architectural signs, from simple directional signs with arrows to complicated evacuation plans are part of an ADA sign system, even though they don't require any tactile elements at all. And even tactile identification signs don't have to be completely readable by touch but can include purely visual information as well.
Jump In. The Water's Fine!
Next: Visual Signs
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