Parking buildings
Parking buildings must provide a suitable number of accessible parks, as set out in NZS 4121 and recommended above (see Car parks and the New Zealand access standard). These parks should be suitably located so that those needing them are not disadvantaged in terms of average travel distances to lifts and to entrances and exits. Locating the accessible parks on the ground level may be the best solution in many cases.
Parking buildings are usually constructed with the minimum practicable headroom. Wheelchair users who transport their chairs on a car roof hoist need additional headroom to rotate the chair to the floor next to the driver’s door. AS 2890.1: 1993, the car parking Standard referenced in D1/AS1, specifies a headroom height of 2.5 m over the distance between the rear of the parking space and a position about where the windscreen of a parked car would be located. (This position is specified as 2160 mm from the front of the park.) The Standard specifies a minimum headroom of 2.2 m for other parks and for the internal access driveways.
NZS 4121:2001 requires a vertical clearance of 2.5 m along the internal access driveways, as well as above the rear of the accessible parking space itself. In some buildings this headroom can be easily achieved, but in other cases AS 2890.1 may be followed.