Using timing delays to create disability friendly access doors to bathrooms

If you own a business you may be obliged to create disabled access. This can be a great business idea, even if you are not legally obliged to provide access, as you will have a broader range of customers and potential employees able to access your building. 

Here are some tips to use timer relays to create accessible workplaces with timer relays. 

Make the timer easier to trigger

Some disabled access toilet have buttons to trigger the door opening but some people can find these challenging to activate so look for ways to make it easy including have braille signage, weight activated door triggers and buttons at different levels to account for people who have various disabilities including disorders that make it hard to bend such as muscular spasms. Disability comes in many forms so the more flexible you can make your timer, the more effective it will be. 

Press once, open twice

Once someone has indicated that they want an automated entrance to the bathroom through pressing a button or triggering a weight sensor, make sure that they rest of the bathroom responds to the trigger. Get this button to open the main entrance door, as well as the door to the cubicle, as after a reasonable delay. It's a good idea to get a disability access consultant to give you an idea on what this delay might need to be, taking into consideration the distance between the first door and the door of the cubicle. 

Integrate other controls

It's important to implement some other controls so that your bathroom patrons don't get injured by the triggers. Consider a sensor that alerts patrons on the other side of the door that the door is open, and a disabled person may be wheeling through. This can help everyone to be safe in the bathroom and stop collisions if people are preoccupied and not paying attention. This is useful for all patrons of the bathroom!

Ask patrons with a disability for advice

It's important to regularly ask for some feedback from the people using the bathroom so that you can see if the bathroom is working as designed. Yu may need to make small tweaks to the timer settings to make sure that it is suited to your bathroom. 

Using a timer relay is a good way to make sure that your workplace bathroom is disabled access friendly and supports your efforts to be a disability-friendly workplace.