ADA Accessibility for Laundry Rooms in Multi-Story Residential Buildings: Floor-Specific Requirements Q&A

[jar546]

Question: In a multi-story residential building where laundry rooms are located on each floor, do all laundry rooms need to be accessible if the accessible dwelling units are only on the first floor?

Answer: No, if the accessible dwelling units are only on the first floor and the laundry rooms are restricted by floor—meaning the first-floor laundry room is for first-floor residents only and the second-floor laundry room is for second-floor residents only—then only the first-floor laundry room needs to be accessible. An accessible route to the second-floor laundry room is not required in this scenario. This ensures that the accessibility requirements are met without unnecessary modifications to other floors.

As confirmed by this advisory:

Advisory 206.2.3 Multi-Story Buildings and Facilities Exception 4. Where common use areas are provided for the use of residents, it is presumed that all such common use areas “serve” accessible dwelling units unless use is restricted to residents occupying certain dwelling units. For example, if all residents are permitted to use all laundry rooms, then all laundry rooms “serve” accessible dwelling units. However, if the laundry room on the first floor is restricted to use by residents on the first floor, and the second floor laundry room is for use by occupants of the second floor, then first floor accessible units are “served” only by laundry rooms on the first floor. In this example, an accessible route is not required to the second floor provided that all accessible units and all common use areas serving them are on the first floor.

 

[Jean Tessmer-HI]

Question: In a multi-story residential building where laundry rooms are located on each floor, do all laundry rooms need to be accessible if the accessible dwelling units are only on the first floor?

Answer: No, if the accessible dwelling units are only on the first floor and the laundry rooms are restricted by floor—meaning the first-floor laundry room is for first-floor residents only and the second-floor laundry room is for second-floor residents only—then only the first-floor laundry room needs to be accessible. An accessible route to the second-floor laundry room is not required in this scenario. This ensures that the accessibility requirements are met without unnecessary modifications to other floors.

As confirmed by this advisory:

Advisory 206.2.3 Multi-Story Buildings and Facilities Exception 4. Where common use areas are provided for the use of residents, it is presumed that all such common use areas “serve” accessible dwelling units unless use is restricted to residents occupying certain dwelling units. For example, if all residents are permitted to use all laundry rooms, then all laundry rooms “serve” accessible dwelling units. However, if the laundry room on the first floor is restricted to use by residents on the first floor, and the second floor laundry room is for use by occupants of the second floor, then first floor accessible units are “served” only by laundry rooms on the first floor. In this example, an accessible route is not required to the second floor provided that all accessible units and all common use areas serving them are on the first floor.

Your information is limited to ADA compliance. By "Multi-story residential building" I am assuming your mean town houses or apartments? If there are four or more dwelling units on each floor than you will need every single ground floor unit to meet FHAG (Fair Housing Act Guidelines) accessibility compliance including accessible routes, parking, USPS cluster boxes, recreation centers, car washes, admin office, and any common element on the ground floor that is shared by all the tenants. The FHAG affects all Multi-Family housing projects with four or more dwelling units. There are a lot of DOJ driven enforcement complaints on multi-family units. Bottom line is you will need to apply the 1990 FHAG with the 1994 supplement, and the ANSI A117.1 1986 to all outside common elements. If there are only steps to the upper floors you only need the ground floor units accessible. If you put the one and only common element on a second floor with not wheelchair access you will need to install an elevator or lift to it. Same for all other common elements I mentioned.

 

[Jean Tessmer-HI]

One more thing. For FHAG if all the floors are served by an elevator, then all the units will need to meet FHAG accessibility requirements.

 

[CASpAccess]

Question: In a multi-story residential building where laundry rooms are located on each floor, do all laundry rooms need to be accessible if the accessible dwelling units are only on the first floor?

In buildings with four or more dwelling units and no elevator, all of the ground floor units are subject to the Act’s design and construction requirements.
In a joint statement HUD and USDOJ clarified that in addition to the dwelling units on the ground floor in a building with no elevator, the public and common use areas are also subject to the Act’s design and construction requirements. Note that the HUD/DOJ joint statement did not repeat the distinction of "ground floor" in relation to the public and common use areas. No exception is provided allowing public and common use areas to be located on floors other than ground floors or floors not served by an elevator.

Thoughts? Syntax, grammar, punctuation and the meaning of defined words makes a difference. Typically courts give "Chevron" deference to an administrative agency's interpretation of its own rules. The FHA falls within HUD's jurisdiction and US DOJ's civil rights division.

The ambiguity arising from HUD / DOJ's use of syntax in their joint statement can be resolved by referring to HUD's Participant Manual addressing Accessible Public and Common Use Areas prepared by Government Technical Representative for HUD - Bearing Point Team for U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development (Publication C-OPC-22667 - October 2005" Pg 43

Since the upper floors in these types of developments are typically not served by an accessible route, public and Common Use areas including the stairs going up, the halls, corridors, breezeways, and the entry doors on the upper levels are not covered under Requirement 2 of the Guidelines. However, if a Common Use facility is located on the upper floor of a walk-up type development, there must be a comparable facility located on the accessible level.

FHADM:
Covered multifamily dwellings are:
1. all dwelling units in buildings containing four or more dwelling units if such buildings have one or more elevators, and
2. all ground floor dwelling units in other buildings containing four or more units.

Dwelling Units in Buildings with Elevator(s)
As is evident from the preceding discussion, the Fair Housing Act’s definition of “covered multifamily dwellings” distinguishes between buildings with elevators and buildings without elevators. Thus, if a building has one or more elevators, all of the dwelling units in the building are covered.
There is one exception to this requirement, and that is when an elevator is provided only as a means of creating an accessible route to dwelling units on a ground floor. In that case, the elevator is not required to serve dwelling units on floors which are not ground floors, and the building is not considered to be a “building with one or more elevators” that would require all of the dwelling units to meet the requirements of the Guidelines.
Ground Floor Dwelling Units The ground floor is defined as a floor of a building with a building entrance on an accessible route. The ground floor may or may not be at grade.
The definition of ground floor further provides that where the first floor containing dwelling units in a building is above grade, all units on that floor must be served by a building entrance on an accessible route. This floor will be considered to be a ground floor.
If more than one story can be designed to have an accessible entrance on an accessible route, then each story becomes a ground floor and all units on those stories are covered. However, the Fair Housing Act and the Guidelines do not require that there be more than one ground floor.

BUILDINGS NOT HAVING ELEVATORS
In buildings not having elevators, only ground floor dwelling units are covered and each dwelling unit must be on an accessible route and meet Requirements 3-7.

It is important to note that some buildings may contain an elevator and not be considered a “building having one or more elevators” for purposes of the Guidelines. For example, when an elevator travels from a garage or other entry level not containing dwelling units only to a “ground floor” containing dwelling units, these “ground floor” units are covered; however, the building is not a “building having one or more elevators” (elevator building) and the elevator is not required to travel to all floors.

If a building elevator is provided only as a means of creating an accessible route from parking to dwelling units on a ground floor, the building is not considered an elevator building. In this case, the dwelling units on the “ground floor,” plus one of each type of public and common use area, must comply with the Guidelines.

Source: FHADM

In buildings with four or more dwelling units and at least one elevator, all dwelling units and all public and common use areas are subject to
the Act’s design and construction requirements. In buildings with four or more dwelling units and no elevator, all ground floor units and public and common use areas are subject to the Act’s design and construction requirements.
Source:
JOINT STATEMENT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF HOUSING AND URBAN DEVELOPMENT AND THE DEPARTMENT OF JUSTICE
ACCESSIBILITY (DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION) REQUIREMENTS FOR COVERED MULTIFAMILY DWELLINGS UNDER THE FAIR HOUSING ACT