On September 30 the District Court for the Eastern District of California denied in part and granted in part a defense motion for summary judgment concerning ADA compliance in the mens restroom at a Bed Bath & Beyond. Feezor v. Excel Stockton LLC, 2013 WL 5486831 (E.D.Cal. 2013). In a 5300 word opinion the Court mentions only once the general rule that a facility should be accessible to and usable by those with disabilities. The rest of the opinion discusses a purely technical interpretation of the Guidelines and Standards that never asks the question: “does this really matter to a person with a disability.”
The longest part of the discussion concerns the portions of the Guidelines and Standards describing the required clear floor area on the pull side of a swinging door. As presented to the Court, it appears the dispute centered on the significance of a “thick solid black line” in the drawings illustrating the clear floor space requirement. Id. at *4. The plaintiff contended that the line represented a wall, and that the inclusion of the wall in the drawing meant that a wall with a minimum length was required. The defendant disagreed. The Court dug into the language of the Guidelines and Standards, prior case law, and the alleged colloquial meaning of the word “strikeside” before concluding that the “thick solid black line” was not intended to indicate that a wall was required. More