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Accessibility in Los Angeles
Hollywood and Vine intersection
Overview: You’ve hit the California lottery jackpot as far as the most wheelchair accessible tourist destination in the world goes. The United States of America passed a civil rights law in 1990 called the Americans with Disabilities Act, or ADA. Whenever you hear people in the US speaking of ADA or ADA-compliant, you’re listening to people speaking about the Americans with Disabilities Act.
Downtown Los Angeles crosswalk
Aside from protection in the workplace for Americans with disabilities, the ADA is a law that enforces the government and public and private sectors to accommodate people with disabilities in whatever way accommodations (reasonable) can be made. This means that sidewalks in America should have ramps, reachable signals and nicely paved and painted crosswalks. Stop signs are larger as well. All businesses should have ramps and elevators and accessible bathrooms. That includes hotels and tourist attractions such as Disneyland and the Hollywood Bowl. Hotels in America should have rooms to accommodate wheelchairs. The rooms should be larger, more spacious than the standard rooms and the bathrooms should be larger and have roll-in showers and/or bathtubs with handrails.
The ADA means that America is probably the most accessible place in the world. It’s certainly more wheelchair accessible than Asia and Europe.
3rd Street Santa Monica crosswalk
And, Los Angeles complies with the ADA to the T (for the most part). I should note as well that crosswalks in Los Angeles have signals for the hearing-impaired with large signals and signs. Los Angeles also accommodates the visually impaired on the streets by providing audible signals at crosswalks as well ramps with braille (not language braille but studded or embossed ramps).
Crosswalk on Rodeo Dr in Beverly Hills
Streets, Sidewalks, Curbs, Buildings: For the most part, the sidewalks in Los Angeles have ramps at the corners, especially on major to semi-major streets. The only places you will find a lack of ramps sometimes on the streets and sidewalks in Los Angeles are in some residential areas. Sunset Blvd, especially Sunset Strip, may perhaps be somewhat challenging because it’s situated at the base of the Hollywood Hills and some of the crosswalks have slants where you’ll lean either to the left or to the right.
Streets in Los Angeles are not like streets in Asia where you can wheel on them. There are bike lanes but the bike lanes exist for bikes. This is because the sidewalks are wide enough and smooth enough to wheel on. They are ADA-compliant. For the most part, buildings have elevators but you will find the occasional business, especially in small plazas and mini-malls where there are just stairs.
Street Addresses: Addresses are have odd numbers on the west side on streets running north and south. Addresses on the south side of streets on streets running east and west have even numbers.