Terence J. Moakley, a persistent advocate for the disabled who fought for wheelchair users to have access to taxicabs and transit systems, died on Sept. 5 in Manhattan. He was 69.
The cause was complications of acute myeloid leukemia, which he learned he had three weeks earlier, his wife, Daisy, said.
Mr. Moakley died less than two weeks before a federal judge in Manhattan approved a settlement that calls for thousands of New York City taxis to be accessible to wheelchairs by 2020. The Sept. 16 decision ended years of litigation and negotiation between the city and the Taxis for All Campaign, a coalition that Mr. Moakley helped create.
Over four decades of advocating the rights of the disabled, Mr. Moakley, a quadriplegic, developed a reputation for making well-researched, even-tempered appeals. But he was not above participating in a public stunt to attract attention to a cause.
In April 2004, Mr. Moakley and six other wheelchair users staged a “roll-in” at a taxi stand outside Pennsylvania Station in Manhattan to show how hard it was for them to get around by cab. They were pressing for support in the City Council for an updating of the fleet.
Ten years later, the Taxi and Limousine Commission agreed to add about 7,000 accessible vehicles to its fleet by 2020. The judge who approved the settlement, George Daniels, said the agreement was one of the most significant acts of inclusion in the city since Jackie Robinson joined the Brooklyn Dodgers.
That was only one of the transportation breakthroughs for which Mr. Moakley could claim some credit. In the 1970s, he and some colleagues at the Eastern Paralyzed Veterans Association sued to gain access for the disabled to the subways and buses operated by the Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Some of the concessions extracted in that litigation were later included in the federal Americans With Disabilities Act, said James Weisman, the general counsel of the organization, now known as the United Spinal Association.
As president of the association in the late 1970s and early 1980s, Mr. Moakley hired students to map out the street corners in the city that did not have curb cuts to allow for wheelchairs, then pressed city officials to make amends.
Terence John Moakley was born in Brooklyn on Dec. 22, 1944, and raised in Hicksville, on Long Island. After earning a bachelor’s degree in English from St. John’s University, he enlisted in the Marine Corps.
While serving stateside, Mr. Moakley broke his neck in a diving accident that left him a quadriplegic. After more than two years in a hospital, he enrolled at Hofstra University and earned a master’s degree in comparative literature.
He had no children of his own, but raised his stepdaughter, Carlin Admirand, the daughter of his second wife. His third wife, Daisy, to whom he was married for eight years, has three daughters, a son and three grandchildren.
Wherever they traveled, Ms. Moakley said, her husband insisted on investigating the public-transit options and, if possible, taking a ride.
“He loved public transportation,” she said. “I swear he thought it was his personal roller coaster.”
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