Interior Signs
Custom ADA Compliant Signs
Almost all buildings that are open to the public in North Jersey are required to have signs that are compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). This includes signs in your parking lot as well as interior and exterior markers. Fortunately, The Sign Center is one of the top suppliers of ADA compliant signs for North Jersey and beyond. With our top-quality, state of the art portfolio of products, we will help your organization meet ADA standards.
Does my business really need ADA-compliant signs?
If your building is open to the public in North Jersey, the answer is almost certainly yes. This includes municipal buildings, retail stores, medical facilities, restaurants, and professional offices. Compliance covers everything from your parking lot to your restrooms and interior suite markers. Thankfully, The Sign Center is one of the top suppliers of ADA compliant signs in North Jersey and Nationwide!
What We Offer
Tactile Room & Suite ID Signs
Raised characters with Grade 2 braille identifying permanent rooms, suites and offices - the category the standard actually requires tactile signage for.
Restroom & Accessible Facility Signs
Restroom, family room and accessible-entrance identification, including the geometric symbols some occupancies require.
Changeable-Insert Name Signs
Room signs with a window insert or slide-in panel, so a name change does not mean paying for a new sign.
Stairwell, Exit & Egress Signs
Stair identification, floor-level designation and area-of-refuge marking, which building code treats separately from ordinary room ID.
Accessible Parking & Van Signs
Exterior post-mounted accessible parking signage, at the mounting heights your municipality enforces.
Department & Directional Signs
Wayfinding and department identification, which follow the visual-character rules rather than the tactile ones.
Products & Solutions
Which signs actually have to be tactile
This is the distinction almost everyone gets wrong in both directions. Signs identifying a permanent room or space - offices, restrooms, stairwells, storage - need raised characters and braille. Directional and informational signs do not; they only have to meet the visual character rules. Buildings routinely pay for braille on wayfinding signs that never needed it, while missing it on the store room door that did.
Mounting height and latch-side placement
Tactile signs mount with the baseline of the lowest character at least 48 inches above the floor and the baseline of the highest no more than 60 inches, on the latch side of the door - or the nearest adjacent wall where there is no latch-side space. An 18 by 18 inch clear floor area must sit in front of the sign, outside the arc of the door swing. The most common inspection failure we see is not a wrong sign, it is a correct sign on the wrong wall.
Character, braille and finish specification
Characters run 5/8 inch to 2 inches tall, raised at least 1/32 inch, in a sans-serif face that is not italic, script or decorative. Braille is contracted Grade 2, placed below the corresponding text with rounded domes rather than square ones. The finish must be non-glare - a gloss face that looks sharp in the showroom can fail on the wall because of it.
Contrast and pictograms
Characters and their background need high contrast, either light on dark or dark on light. Where a pictogram is used, its field has to be at least 6 inches high and any text belongs below that field, not inside it. Brand colours can usually be worked in, but the contrast rule decides which of your colours can carry the text.
Where New Jersey code sits on top of the federal standard
The ADA Standards are federal, but what an inspector checks in New Jersey is the Uniform Construction Code as well - which carries its own requirements for stair identification, floor-level signage and areas of refuge. A sign package can satisfy the ADA and still fail an inspection because the egress signage was scoped to the wrong document.
Our Work
On-site compliance survey
We walk the building, photograph every door and produce a numbered sign schedule of what is missing and where, before anything is quoted.
Compliant and on brand
Your colours, logo and typeface wherever the legibility rules allow. Compliance does not have to look institutional.
Drawn to the current standard
Heights, character sizes, braille and contrast are specified from the 2010 ADA Standards, not copied from the signs already on your wall.
Service after install
We service what we install - insert changes, replacements and additions as tenants and departments move.
Our Process
Site survey & sign schedule
We walk the building, photograph every door and produce a numbered schedule of what is required and exactly where it goes.
Compliance review & design
Every sign is checked against the character, braille, contrast and mounting rules before it is made, with your branding applied inside those limits.
Fabrication
Signs are produced to the approved schedule, with insert-style signs built so names can change later without replacing the plate.
Installation to spec
Mounted at the correct height on the correct side of each door, with the clear floor space kept outside the door swing.
As-built schedule
You keep the numbered schedule, so anything added later matches what is already on the walls.