Opinion ID: 527543
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Federal-Aid Highway Act

Text: 52 Although ADAPT raised the issue below, the district court reached its conclusion that Congress has not ordered mainstreaming of the disabled without commenting on section 105(b) of the Federal-Aid Highway Act. We hold what is implicit in the district court's silence, that the Federal-Aid Highway Act does not speak to whether mainstreaming is required. 53 Section 105(b) of the Federal-Aid Highway Act, amending section 165(b) of the Federal-Aid Highway Act of 1973, provided that DOT must require that projects funded pursuant to particular provisions of the Federal-Aid Highway Act be planned, designed, constructed, and operated to allow effective utilization by ... handicapped persons. 23 U.S.C. Sec. 142 note. The projects included within the purview of section 165(b) include construction of high occupancy vehicle lanes, highway traffic control devices, bus passenger loading areas and facilities ... and fringe and transportation corridor parking facilities, the purchase of buses, and the construction, reconstruction, and improvement of fixed rail facilities including ... rolling stock. 23 U.S.C. Sec. 142(a) (incorporated by reference into 23 U.S.C. Sec. 142 note). DOT acknowledges that this amendment expressed a clear intention of requiring increased accessibility to mass transit. DOT, however, argues persuasively that the amendment did not mandate mainstream accessibility. 54 With regard to this amendment, the Senate Report stated: 55 The bill contains a statement of national policy which is similar to that found in Section 16(a) of the Urban Mass Transportation Act of 1964, as amended, and which declares that elderly and handicapped persons have the same right to utilize mass transportation systems as other persons. This amendment goes further than the Urban Mass Transportation Act, however, permitting the Secretary to approve only those programs or projects which comply, to the maximum extent feasible, with the provisions of this subsection. 56 S.Rep. No. 1111, 93d Cong., 2d Sess. 8 (1974) (emphasis added). The amendment may have been intended to go[ ] further than [UMTA], id., in the sense that it added the enforcement mechanism of requiring DOT to withhold approval where certain new federally-funded facilities, buses and rolling stock were not made accessible, but it continued to emphasize that efforts of accommodation are to be limited by feasibility, and we understand feasibility to include financial, engineering and physical plant considerations. 57 By its terms, the Federal-Aid Highway Act does not speak to whether a system as a whole must be accessible. The text of the act, see supra at 1194, directs the Secretary to require that projects, including buses, purchased with certain federal funds, be designed and operated to allow effective utilization by the handicapped. It thus arguably requires that certain funds appropriated for projects involving the areas that serve as ingress and egress to transportation be spent on accessible projects and that new buses and rolling stock be accessible. It does not speak to what is required of existing systems. Insofar as a system, whether it is fully accessible, paratransit-oriented, or a combination, gets funds for these new facilities or purchases new buses and rolling stock pursuant to the statutory provisions listed in section 165 of the Federal-Aid Highway Act, that Act may require those new additions to be accessible. 8 However, section 165 does not indicate whether existing systems may incorporate paratransit services or provide transportation to the handicapped solely through paratransit. Section 165 thus does not speak to the issue of mainstreaming, but only to new purchases. It therefore does not undermine the Secretary's interpretation of the transportation acts in Subpart E. 9 See infra at 1197-99. 58