‘Lend a hand to make life easier for the disabled’
AS A blind person, I am an active campaigner for equitable access for all people with disabilities. This means that I believe that people with disabilities should have equal or parallel access to the same opportunities, goods and services that other people without any disadvantage can access.
Access means different things to different groups. A well-designed environment can take account of blind people’s needs, for example, but sometimes there’s a conflict between the needs of one group and another. For instance, in some city areas there are slopes off the pavement so that people who use wheelchairs can cross the street, but those slopes can pose a risk to blind people, who could wander into traffic because they are looking for the curb.
Design that successfully incorporates all the needs of the various different types of disability is known as universal design and is the gold standard in equitable access, but it is not always achievable.
People with disabilities do not speak for people with other types of disabilities, so I can speak only for the needs of blind people. For us, access to the written word is one of the most crucial issues. I can go for longer without food than without reading, and to ensure my access, I use four different technologies to help me.
I have a Braille Note that delivers Braille or synthetic speech for reading from digital sources, but Braille in general is expensive and takes time to produce, so it’s often not immediately available for magazines or books. I have an audio player and I read e-books off a memory stick on my computer. Jeanette, my PA, also reads for me, scanning the media in which we are interested. But most blind people don’t have the advantage of personal readers, although a family member could read for them.
It is possible for websites to be designed so that text and images can be accessed by blind and partially sighted people so that this portion of the population is not excluded if they do not have access to the support of others or to the expensive technology that delivers the written word to them.
With successful universal design, everyone gets in via the same route, but when equitable access is not possible, perhaps parallel access can be achieved. For example, wheelchair users may not be able to use the stairs, but a ramp can easily be created alongside a staircase. If that’s not possible, then at the very least there should be an acceptable alternative route.
We should have a world that is designed to consider all kinds of users, but even in well-resourced countries like the US, people with disabilities have difficulties daily. In South Africa we have admirable and world-class legislation and policies, but the implementation is very poor, especially in the area of access. Unless there is a radical change in approach, we are not going to see universal access realised.
But there are some positive stories to tell. The SA Reserve Bank recently met with a representatives from the SA National Council for the Blind to discuss the new Mandela commemorative bank note series due for release in July. There will be five bank notes and a R5 coin, and they have markings that make them easier to identify. In my opinion, these markings are not adequate, but at least they engaged with us on whether the design was accessible.
Another good example is the Michaelis Gallery in Cape Town where they have pictures processed in such a way that blind people can feel them. They have also considered people who use wheelchairs.
The gallery is in a listed building, which means that the exterior cannot be tampered with, but they obtained special permission to break down part of a wall to install an accessibility ramp.
On some airlines, when I am seated an attendant comes to my seat and delivers a verbal briefing, checks that I understand how to use the equipment, tells me where the nearest exits and toilets are and shows me how to use the call button. On SAA, there is a Braille manual, and I was proud to be part of those negotiations.
When I was in Mexico last November, when we were departing through Mexico City Airport, I was served by nine airport staff, three of whom were disabled, in the time it took to walk from the entrance to the airport lounge. The people who checked my boarding pass were disabled people. Why not?
For any individual or representative of an organisation of any kind reading this, consider what you can do to make the lives of the disabled people easier.
WHAT CAN YOU DO TO MAKE THINGS EASIER FOR SOMEONE LIVING WITH A DISABILITY?