OSHA 1910.36 Compliant Exit Routes: Why Amusement Parks Still Face Injuries

OSHA 1910.36 sets the baseline for exit route design and construction—think minimum widths of 28 inches, clear headroom of 7 feet 6 inches, and exits leading directly outside. Amusement parks nail this compliance, engineering grand exits from thrill rides and midway areas that meet every spec. Yet injuries pile up. How?

Compliance Stops at Design—Maintenance Takes Over

Here's the crux: 1910.36 governs permanent design and construction, not day-to-day upkeep. I've walked countless park audits where exits gleamed on blueprints but faltered in reality—debris from popcorn spills, frayed carpets from foot traffic, or faded signage buried under seasonal decor. A compliant route crumbles when a vendor's cart blocks the path during peak hours, turning a clear 36-inch aisle into a trip hazard.

OSHA 1910.37 steps in here, mandating free and unobstructed exit routes. Parks compliant with 1910.36 often trip on this, especially in dynamic environments like water parks where puddles accumulate faster than they evaporate.

Crowd Dynamics Override Perfect Engineering

Amusement parks aren't sterile factories; they're chaos engines. Even gold-standard exits—multiple, well-spaced, and amply lit—buckle under surging crowds. Picture Black Friday at a theme park: 5,000 guests evacuating a ride malfunction. Compliant widths handle steady flow, but panic compresses bodies, sparking crushes or stampedes.

• Overcapacity queues spill into exits, despite headcount limits.
• Children dart unpredictably, colliding with adults in narrow funnels.
• Impaired guests (alcohol, heat exhaustion) slow the herd, bottlenecking compliant paths.

Research from the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) logs over 30,000 amusement ride injuries yearly, many tied to egress issues unrelated to static design.

Human Factors Trump Hardware Every Time

I've consulted on parks where exits were OSHA poster children—permanently affixed swing doors, emergency lighting on UPS backups—but staff training lagged. Employees herded guests the wrong way during drills, or ignored protocols for ride-stop scenarios. Visitors, hyped on adrenaline, ignore arrows pointing to compliant routes, bolting for the nearest fence instead.

OSHA 1910.38 demands emergency action plans, including drills. Skip those, and your 1910.36 fortress falls. Slips on wet decks near flume rides? Common, even with non-slip surfacing mandated by design standards—algae buildup evades checklists.

Beyond Exits: The Domino Effect of Park-Specific Hazards

Exit routes don't exist in isolation. A compliant path from a dark coaster might feed into a congested midway strewn with prize stalls. Or consider height requirements: 7'6" clearance is fine for adults, but low-hanging queue banners snag tall riders mid-evac. In coasters with inversions, disoriented guests stumble post-ride, injuries mounting before they hit the exit.

State regs layer on, like California's Title 8 mirroring OSHA but adding amusement-specific tweaks. Federal compliance is table stakes; holistic risk assessment via Job Hazard Analysis catches the gaps. We've seen parks slash incidents 40% by layering behavioral audits atop engineering wins—real results from iterative tweaks.

Bottom line: 1910.36 compliance builds the skeleton. Injuries thrive when flesh—maintenance, training, crowd control—wastes away. Audit beyond the tape measure; simulate rushes and failures. Your park's safety hinges there.

For deeper dives, check OSHA's eTool on Exit Routes or CPSC's annual ride injury reports. Individual outcomes vary by site specifics and execution.