Set on a steep hill with winding sidewalks and narrow access points, Ellicott City’s Main Street wasn’t exactly built with wheelchair accessibility in mind.

As planning begins for a major renovation of Main Street — which experienced tremendous damage to roadways and sidewalks from last year’s flash flood — members of the county’s Commission on Disability Issues are pressing for improvements to accessibility.

Elliott Finkelstein, a commission member, raised the issue at a recent workshop on the Ellicott City Watershed Master Plan, which is looking at ways to upgrade flood mitigation while adding infrastructure projects to the historic district.

Finkelstein uses a power wheelchair, a device that weighs several hundred pounds, making it nearly impossible to lift over curbs or steps into shops. He said that with limited handicapped-designated parking spaces, narrow sidewalks and steps leading into many stores, he’s forced to largely avoid the area.

“How do you fit the modern types of access in a historic community? That’s a tough one to do,” Finkelstein said. “Not all the stores are going to be able to welcome the requirements that are needed; they’re narrow buildings with narrow floorways and narrow halls. [You’ve] just got to do the best you can.”

But he also said: “Of course when you can’t accommodate people, you lose business.”

Main Street is home to more than 60 businesses, nearly all in historic buildings.

The potential loss of business is what Marian Vessels, another commission member who also uses a power wheelchair, hopes will drive businesses in the area to make their buildings more accessible.

“As we’re reconstructing what we think Ellicott City should be, how is it that we can make these very old streets and buildings more accessible?” Vessels said. “Stores can lose out on sales if people can’t get in.”

Today more than 2 million Americans use wheelchairs and more than 6 million rely on walkers, canes or crutches for assistance, according to National Institute of Health data.

Howard County enforces Maryland’s Accessibility Code, which includes the 2010 Americans with Disability Act standards. But when an owner of a historic building wants to make changes to its exterior — even to satisfy ADA requirements — that request must be reviewed by the county’s five-member Historic Preservation Commission for its approval by a majority vote.

Beth Burgess, chief of the resource conservation division within the county’s planning and zoning department, said the commission tries to be “lenient” with property owners to ensure their buildings can be made accessible while still maintaining their historic integrity.

She said over the past year the commission approved about 60 minor alterations. Substantial changes, such as widening a storefront door frame or building a permanent ramp, can take up to two months to be approved.

The county also has a specific set of Ellicott City Historic District Design Guidelines that include recommendations against replacing buildings’ original front doors and for preserving the “form and detail” of historic storefronts.

Advocates note that the guidelines, which are more than 20 years old, currently don’t include any mention of ADA compliance.

Burgess said the department is in the midst of creating an updated version to include that compliance. The new guidelines, expected to be published by the end of 2018, would include recommendations for making historic buildings more accessible and expectations for how new buildings in the district can meet ADA standards.

In the meantime, commission members and other officials are expected to tour the district in coming weeks to consider possible upgrades as past of the watershed master plan.

kmagill@baltsun.com