Memorandum - NHTSA

111-2
Generally, there is very little information regarding WC lift accidents and injuries. Very few lj ft
related accidents or injuries can be associated directly with the requirements except by anecdo1:al
information or defect investigations conducted by the agency. NHTSA has conducted a few
defect investigations concerning WC lifts in the 10-12 years prior to the SNPRM. The
commenters presented little, if any, lift user injury data (WC user or otherwise). A recent TRP:
article on tort liability arising out of the ADA shows that for the 1991- 1995 period there have
been a limited number of tort claims, out of millions of fare trips, filed against a sample of 43
transit companies involving disabled riders involving wheelchairs.* WC lifts were not implicz ted
as a source of injury or the subject of a tort in this study.
Since implementation of the ADA, there has been a doubling in “disabled riders” from 7,534,002
(1991) to 16,839,291 (1995) based on the responses of 43 transit agencies responding to a TCIP
survey. For the same agencies (1991-1995), WC ridership, based on the number of trips,
increased by a factor of 5 [from 298,912 (1991) to 1,498,395)].3 There are 6,000 agencies that
provide public transportation in the U.S. and they have probably experienced similar increases.
Although the number of WC related tort claims increased for the same 43 agencies from 1 to 2 7
from 1991 to 1995, liftshamps are not mentioned as a source of injury or a tort liability issue.
* Potential Tort Liability for Transit Agencies Arising Out of the Americans with
Disabilities Act, Transit Cooperative Research Project (TCRP), Legal Research Digest, No 11 ,
July 1998, Transportation Research Board (TRB), National Research Council.
Ibid