DENVER — At the corner of Broadway and Colfax, in the heart of downtown Denver, is a piece of history credited with changing the landscape around accessible public transportation throughout the country.
Denver City Council is among those in support of changing the name of Civic Center Station to honor the pivotal role of a protest near that bus stop.
It was in July of 1978 when Reverend Wade Blank led what's now known as the Gang of 19 to the intersection. Blank, who did not live with a disability, was an advocate for accessibility. The group surrounded Regional Transportation District (RTD) buses and demanded public transportation be wheelchair accessible.
At the time, RTD had recently ordered 250 buses without wheelchair lifts. After the protest, RTD updated a third of its fleet to include wheelchair lifts.
According to RTD, seven years after the Gang of 19's protest, RTD "became the first metropolitan region in the country to provide wheelchair-accessible service on all local buses."
In addition, the protest is widely credited for being the catalyst to the American with Disabilities Act (ADA), which was passed in 1990.
On Monday, Denver City Council voted unanimously in support of renaming Civic Center Station in honor of Blank. The proclamation from City Council states that Blank "established the first independent living center in Denver in 1975, laying the foundation for a national movement dedicated to advocating for the civil rights of people with disabilities, including the right to accessible transportation, home health care services, and independent living."
Councilman Chris Hinds represents District 10, and this proclamation was personal for him.
"I'm the first elected official in Denver's history — local, state or federal — who uses a wheelchair to get around, and the first who identifies as a member of the disability community," Hinds said.
Hinds was hit by a car in 2008 and is now in a wheelchair.
"Many of us need a critical event, a moment in our life, to try to reset. And I went from trying to make this world a better place for me to just trying to make this world a better place," said Hinds. "I'm sure I would not be an elected official if not for that crash and representing the disability community."
If RTD decides to change the name of Civic Center Station, Hinds hopes it gives the public the chance to learn about the history of disability rights in Denver.
"This is so groundbreaking. RTD had to create a process to rename a station for this. So that's how unusual it is," Hinds said.
The application to change the name of Civic Center Station has been submitted to RTD, which convened an Honorary Property Name Proposal Committee comprised of staff and community members who will review the proposal. The committee is expected to meet three times over the next few months, before making a recommendation to the Board of Directors.
Emily Harvey is the co-legal director of Disability Law Colorado, a nonprofit organization that advocates for people with disabilities. Harvey, who has used a prosthetic leg since she was two years old, supports the honorary renaming of Civic Center Station.
"Denver was the birthplace of this movement, pushing for the Americans with Disabilities Act," said Harvey. "I didn't know about any of this history growing up and I grew up in the 1980s and 1990s with a disability, and I think that just goes to show that we do a poor job of educating people about this community... A lot of people with disabilities do use public transportation and Civic Center Station is a very central location, so I hope that it will bring pride and awareness to this community."
According to Harvey, there is still room to improve upon accessibility for people with disabilities throughout Colorado.
"I think physical accessibility-wise, we're fairly accessible, but I still see people in wheelchairs going down the street instead of on the sidewalk, because of barriers," Harvey said. "If we're talking about accessibility to the community — which when we're talking about the Gang of 19, the whole reason they were advocating for accessible transportation was because they had gotten out of the nursing home and now wanted to access more of their community — I think nationwide, in Colorado and in Denver, we still see a lot of people with disabilities who are in nursing homes and not able to access care in the community, so they're still being shut away."
Harvey also mentioned that there are accessibility obstacles when it comes to rideshare options.
The decision to change the name of Civic Center Station rests with the RTD Board of Directors, who will likely vote on the proposal in July or September.
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