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This topic comprises 2 pages: 1 2
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Author
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Topic: "Two Thumbs Up" for stadium seating
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Gerard S. Cohen
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 975
From: Forest Hills, NY, USA
Registered: Sep 2001
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posted 12-14-2001 06:47 PM
I read the press release and was dismayed to find not one word acknowledging the needs of handicapped theatre patrons, many veterans
who have been wounded and handicapped defending their country.Non-stadium seating theatres provide places for wheelchairs, and that system has been working well in the theatres I've worked. Why can't new theatres incorporate an elevator for the elderly and handicapped,
parents with infants, etc? The elevator could also be used to transport films to and from the booth, or used to access the manager's offices as has been the case with some NYC theatres since the 1930's. Considering the millions paid to architects and construction contractors, the elevator could be incorporated into the cost and gain our industry the esteem and good will of the public! And Bill, people with disabilities are human beings with rights equal to yours and mine. And YES, the blind and deaf DO ATTEND MOVIES in large numbers, and enjoy as much as they can of the social and emotional-artistic, fun experience. Why else do we lend or rent infra-red or FM receivers to the hard-of-hearing, or accommodate groups of blind patrons from The Light House and other support groups?
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Richard C. Wolfe
Master Film Handler
Posts: 250
From: Northampton, PA, USA
Registered: Apr 2000
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posted 12-15-2001 12:49 AM
Gerard seems to think that the least a theatre can do is install an elevator to get to stadium seating, and the projection booth, and the office etc. etc. He wants theatre companies and independents to spend nearly a hundred thousand dollars per theatre for a relatively few people. Where will this money come from? Most of these companies are already in bankruptcy. Besides, where will these elevators take them? Will it bring them to the top of the stadium, or deliver them to the middle somehow. Wherever it delivers the patron, that location won't be acceptable to some. How many elevators will a theatre need... one per auditorium or one per plex? If only one per plex, how do you get someone from an elevator to everyone of the auditoriums? Do you have hallways running throughout the 2nd floor behind the projection booth with other halls connecting to each auditorium? That would create a separate booth for each theatre. Not very practical. The expense goes way beyond the cost of the elevator. What about policing these extra entrances and hallways? Plexes have a problem now with people jumping from one theatre to another, this would make it even worse. I have read where some handicap advocate groups want to be able to have equal to the best seating in the theatre, right in the very center. Now isn't it interesting that if we remove the seats at what is considered the very best location (regardless where that is) and make that area for the handicapped, then they will be the ONLY ones to get the best seating area. Another example of reverse discrimation. Almost every stadium theatre that I have ever seen has a section of conventional sloped seating in the front and locates the wheelchair spaces at the rear of the sloped section, which is about a quarter of the way back from the front. I find this to be a very acceptable location for the wheelchair spaces. I often sit there myself and see nothing wrong with that location. Actually I think it would be better if a couple more rows would be left sloped and a few less stadium so that the handicap spaces would be a little further back, and so seniors or anyone not wanting stadium seating would have a larger choice of seat locations. Either of those would be better then adding the cost of elevators to theatres.
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Joe Redifer
You need a beating today
Posts: 12859
From: Denver, Colorado
Registered: May 99
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posted 12-15-2001 01:08 AM
quote:
Gerard S. Cohen said:Why can't new theatres incorporate an elevator for the elderly and handicapped, parents with infants, etc?
Infants should not be allowed in movie theaters.
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Gerard S. Cohen
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 975
From: Forest Hills, NY, USA
Registered: Sep 2001
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posted 12-15-2001 04:53 PM
Richard and Dave say they have seen stadium-seated theatres with accommodations for wheelchairs. And I have just heard from a patron of a Valley Stream megaplex that an entire level is accessible, with room for about 24 wheelchairs. I agree with John that "reasonable accommodation should be made." We all grow old, and the American population is graying at an ever-increasing rate as modern medicine
helps prolong our lives. "Grow old along with me--The best is yet to be." should be our belief. Is not one true measure of a society the way it treats its elderly, and its weakest members? Hitler promulgated a cult of strength and physical perfection and condemned
"imperfects" to death, though his impotence and Goering's obesity
showed the falsity of his claims.Jim's statement "the handicap groups pushing the issue of stadium seating have one desire--that everyone suffer the same limitations they do" seems to me a cynical misunderstanding of the use of legal pressure to bring an issue to public attention in order to produce
some form of "reasonable accommodation." This issue has a parallel affecting not a minority, but the majority
of our population who are female. If you've gone to a Broadway show or an older athletic stadium, you've probably been frustrated by
waiting for women whose access to restroom facilities has been hampered by waiting on long lines. In my theatre and in numerous stadiums, women have resorted to taking over the men's rooms because
the architects flagrantly disregarded the "potty-parity" needs of female patrons in the outfitting of the rest rooms. Were the architects all stupid? or did they bend against better judgement throughout the 19th and most of the 20th centuries to the economies
imposed by stingy misogynistic theater moguls? Fortunately, "I was
blind but now I see" enables us to make progress in overcoming inequality. Newer facilities follow fairer building codes. Dave has "never seen a wheelchair at a movie." I have seen them every day at the Continental III in Forest Hills, where the manager made places midway on the center aisle and at the rear. Perhaps
because the Seniors' Self-Help Center on Austin Street was only a block away, we had a lively and wheely crowd of seniors. Joe stated "Infants should not be allowed in a movie theatre."
Where cinema is part of the folk culture, the family turns out as a group. Maybe it's not part of the culture to trust the infants to
baby sitters, or it's too expensive, or sitters are not available,
but Valley Stream multiplexes provide booster-box seats in the rear rows for infants and toddlers, and some theatres check strollers in the lobby. I am hard put to think of anywhere I'd prohibit infants,
with the exception perhaps of coal mines, smoker's bars or brothels.
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Gerard S. Cohen
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 975
From: Forest Hills, NY, USA
Registered: Sep 2001
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posted 12-15-2001 06:06 PM
Why do babies cry? Most often because they are hungry, wet,
in pain or sick. Healthy babies usually sleep most of the time in a cinema. When hungry, they nurse. When they need changing, the mothers
take them to the fold-down tables located in the restroom area. You
find these tables prominently labeled in Mens' and Women's lavatories
in theatres, fast-food restaurants, train stations, airports, hospitals, courthouses and other public buildings. They are in all
the toll-road highways in the Northeast, and by now, or soon, you will
find them coast-to-coast. Providing the facilities ("If you build it,
they will come") is a form of education. When parents are encouraged to use facilities for comforting their babies, the crying-baby
problem will significantly diminish.
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Paul Cassidy
Jedi Master Film Handler
Posts: 549
From: Auckland, New Zealand
Registered: Aug 2001
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posted 12-15-2001 09:39 PM
We had stadium seating in our cinema and the only access to the auditorium was up these steep steps , if we were to renovate or rebuild in any way we would have to supply a lift for these users at a Cost of up to $30,000 ,so you can see why not too many old theatres did too much renovating, anyway if we did get any wheel chair patrons we would use the fire exit which was at street level and they could have a nice place in the stalls area , BUT in the fire Code that we had , stated that no wheel chairs were allowed in the cinema and that those people would need to seated , if a fire occurred they would need to be carried from the theatre ,as the wheel chair would be a obstruction ? so what do you do? provide access for somthing that is not allowed in there in the first place , GOT ME 
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