ADA Parking Compliance Audit in Gladstone, Oregon: What to Expect

What an ADA Parking Audit Actually Looks Like in Gladstone

Most Gladstone owners only think about an ADA parking audit after a demand letter lands or a tenant complains. By then the conversation is reactive and expensive. A voluntary audit flips that: a measured walk-through of your lot tells you exactly where you stand before anyone files anything. This guide describes what that walk-through covers on a Gladstone lot, what we tend to find on the older properties around Portland Avenue and the riverfront, and how the findings become a prioritized fix plan.

For the legal backdrop, our ADA parking compliance guide for Oregon explains why every public-facing Gladstone lot carries an ongoing duty regardless of its age. This page is about the inspection itself. For the general methodology, see the ADA compliance audit process.

Step One: Count and Ratio

The audit starts with a simple count. We total the parking spaces, then check the accessible count against the 2010 Standards: one accessible space for lots up to 25, two for 26–50, three for 51–75, four for 76–100, and up. Then comes the van check — at least one accessible space per six must be van-accessible, rounded up, so a small Gladstone lot's single accessible stall has to be van-built. A surprising number of Gladstone lots have the right total number of accessible stalls but zero van-accessible stalls, which is an automatic finding.

Step Two: Measure Every Accessible Stall and Aisle

Eyeballing does not survive an audit, so this step is all tape measure and digital level:

• Stall width — 8 feet minimum for both standard and van stalls
• Access aisle width — 5 feet standard, 8 feet for van (or the 11-plus-5 van layout)
• Slope — under 2 percent in every direction on the stall and aisle
• Vertical clearance — 98 inches along van routes
• Aisle markings — diagonal hatching present and legible, "NO PARKING" intact

Gladstone's riverside grades make slope a recurring problem. A stall built flat thirty years ago can settle past 2 percent, and that small drift is a genuine violation even though nobody parking there would notice.

Step Three: Signs and the Oregon Fine Plate

Each accessible stall gets a sign check: is the bottom of the sign at least 60 inches above the pavement, does it carry the accessibility symbol, and do van stalls add the "Van Accessible" plate? Then the Oregon-specific check — under ORS 447.233, the sign must also show the fine amount for illegal parking. Missing or low signs, and signs lacking the Oregon fine plate, are among the most common findings on Gladstone lots, especially where signage was installed before the property changed hands.

Step Four: The Accessible Route

An accessible stall is useless if the path to the door is not accessible. We trace the route from the accessible stalls to the building entrance, looking for breaks: abrupt level changes over a quarter inch, cracks wide enough to catch a caster, ponding water, missing or non-compliant curb ramps, and running slope over the allowed limit. On Gladstone's older lots, deteriorated asphalt and settled curb cuts along this route are frequent findings.

The Violations We Find Most Often in Gladstone

• Faded or missing accessibility symbols in the stalls
• No van-accessible space on a small lot
• Access aisles too narrow or with worn-off hatching
• Signs mounted too low or missing the Oregon fine plate
• Slope over 2 percent from settling
• Broken accessible route — cracks, level changes, or a failed curb ramp

Our roundup of the 10 most common ADA parking violations goes deeper on each, with the fix for each one.

From Findings to a Fix Plan

A good audit does not just hand you a list of problems — it ranks them. We separate the cheap, fast fixes (repaint a symbol, raise a sign, add the fine plate) from the bigger items (regrade a settled stall, rebuild a curb ramp, re-lay an aisle). For a Gladstone owner, that prioritization matters: it lets you close the easy, high-visibility gaps immediately while you budget the structural work. The federal "readily achievable" standard for existing facilities actually expects this kind of staged, good-faith progress.

Why a Voluntary Audit Beats a Reactive One

The cost of a voluntary audit and the fixes that follow is almost always a fraction of a settlement plus attorney fees, and it puts you in front of the problem instead of behind it. For Gladstone businesses on the busy McLoughlin and Portland Avenue corridors, where foot traffic is steady, a clean accessible lot is also simply better service. Cojo Excavation & Asphalt audits and corrects accessible parking throughout Gladstone and Clackamas County. We measure the lot, document every finding, and hand you a prioritized plan. When you are ready to act, our parking lot striping in Gladstone guide and our professional striping services cover the corrective work.