ADA "Readily Achievable" Barrier Removal in Parking Lots

The Duty That Applies to Lots You Already Have

A lot of parking-lot accessibility questions come down to one worry: my lot is old and was built before the current standards, so do I have to do anything? For private businesses, the answer lives in a specific ADA concept called "readily achievable barrier removal." It is an ongoing duty that applies to existing facilities, separate from the rules that kick in when you build or alter, and it is the reason an old lot is never simply off the hook.

This page explains the readily achievable standard and what it means for parking. The general accessible-parking requirements are in our ADA parking compliance guide for Oregon, and this is general guidance, not legal advice.

What "Readily Achievable" Means

Under Title III of the ADA, businesses that are public accommodations have a continuing obligation to remove architectural barriers in existing facilities where doing so is "readily achievable." The statute defines readily achievable as "easily accomplishable and able to be carried out without much difficulty or expense."

That is a flexible standard, and deliberately so. What is readily achievable for a large, well-resourced business may not be for a small one. The analysis weighs the nature and cost of the removal against the resources of the business. A fix that is cheap and simple is almost always readily achievable; one that is expensive and complex may not be, depending on the business's circumstances.

The key point for parking: many parking-lot barriers are exactly the kind of cheap, simple fixes that are readily achievable for almost any business, which means the duty to remove them is real and ongoing.

Why Parking Fixes Are Usually Readily Achievable

Parking-lot barriers tend to be inexpensive to remove, which puts most of them squarely in readily-achievable territory:

• Restriping accessible spaces and aisles is ordinary, low-cost work
• Repainting a faded accessibility symbol is a minor line item
• Installing or raising a sign to the correct 60-inch height is a few hundred dollars
• Adding a van-accessible designation is a sign change
• Relocating a cart corral out of an access aisle costs little

These are the very violations covered in our 10 most common ADA parking violations page, and most of them are cheap enough that a business would struggle to argue they are not readily achievable. The duty therefore reaches them directly.

A smaller set of parking barriers, regrading a slope, installing a curb ramp, is more expensive and may or may not be readily achievable depending on the business. But even there, the inexpensive fixes are expected first.

Do the Cheap Fixes First

The readily achievable framework includes a sensible priority order. The Department of Justice has suggested that businesses approach barrier removal in a logical sequence, generally starting with getting people through the door, providing accessible parking and an accessible route to the entrance, before moving to barriers deeper inside the facility.

For parking specifically, that means the accessible spaces, their aisles, the signage, and the route to the entrance are high on the priority list, because they are the first barrier a customer with a disability encounters and they are usually low-cost to fix. A business doing barrier removal in good faith addresses its accessible parking early, not last.

This Is Not the Same as Grandfathering

The readily achievable duty is exactly why the so-called "grandfather clause" for old lots is a myth. There is no provision that exempts an existing lot from accessibility just because it predates the current standards. Instead, existing facilities owe this ongoing duty to remove barriers that are readily achievable, and the standards that apply when you alter the lot apply on top of that. We unpack this fully in our ADA grandfather clause myth page.

So an old lot's obligation is real and continuous: keep removing the readily achievable barriers as you become able to, and meet the alteration standards when you do work. There is no point at which an existing lot is permanently exempt.

A Practical Approach

For an Oregon business owner thinking about an existing lot:

• Get the lot assessed against the accessible-parking elements through an ADA compliance audit process
• Identify which barriers are present and sort them by cost
• Remove the low-cost, high-impact parking barriers, striping, symbols, signs, aisle clearance, promptly, since these are almost always readily achievable
• Plan the more expensive structural fixes, like regrading or ramps, deliberately, and tie them to any repaving you do
• Document your barrier-removal efforts, which demonstrates good-faith compliance

This is general guidance, and whether a specific fix is readily achievable for your business depends on your circumstances, which an attorney can assess. But the inexpensive parking fixes are the ones courts and the DOJ expect, and they are ordinary striping and signage work.