Accessibility
Context
Today, persons with disabilities and older persons make up 25% of the global population. In spite of the opportunities and innovative policies of urbanization, they still face daily barriers to participate in the city’s social and economic life due to of lack of accessibility to the built, digital and social environments. Barriers range from poorly planned physical infrastructure (from roads and housing, to public buildings and spaces, to basic urban services) to lack of access to services (such as information and communications), and have a direct impact both on the individual level – hampering one’s quality of life – and on the development of a community as a whole. During this pandemic, equity and accessibility are more critical than ever, serving as mechanisms for safety, sustainability and solidarity. Many of the responses in terms of improving accessibility to education, culture and health services actually reflect requests that have been proposed from the disability/accessibility community before the COVID-19 outbreak. As we work on recovery measures, accessibility should remain at the heart of the municipal agenda as a fundamental tool to promote equality, inclusion and resilience.
50%
More than 50% of all persons with disabilities and older persons live in cities and towns today.
2B
By 2050, it is estimated that this number will grow to represent over 2 billion persons around the world.
Challenges
People with disabilities and older persons face multiple forms of exclusion from discriminatory laws and policies, limited access to employment and education, and lack of support services that would enable the enjoyment of their human rights, such as the right to life, mobility and political participation. This leads to disproportionate rates of poverty, deprivation and exclusion. As local governments try to ensure equitable access to public goods and services, they are faced with challenges such as budget constraints, low inter-agency coordination, lack of training and tools, lack of disaggregated data to understand the barriers faced by this population and limited awareness and understanding of accessibility. In that sense, engaging with these communities and having more information about what accessibility means in their context is key to plan for effective responses, particularly in times of emergency. This video provides an interesting perspective on those challenges.
Learn more about the challenges being faced by cities and regions
Needs
Addressing inequalities will be fundamental in the recovery phase. Local and regional governments need to ensure and be responsible for the full participation of all citizens to develop and foster inclusive public policies, legislation, plans, and programs to face the pandemic and ensure a more equitable future. To that end, accessible information and communication are essential in ensuring equity and accessibility as it is promoting a strategic dialogue with civil society and other urban stakeholders to co-create effective policies and programs and provide resources to address barriers to accessibility
Responses
New York assigned provisions for digital services for those who did not have devices and connections at home
Responses
Complementary to isolation orders, Abu Dhabi is providing online mental health services and onsite medical attention directly to the people’s homes
New York assigned provisions for digital services for those who did not have devices and connections at home
Learn more about other responses and initiatives in terms of Accessibility:
Key Takeaways
- During and after the pandemic, local and regional governments must ensure universal accessibility to public goods and services, including access to communication and information, as a way to guarantee individual rights and promote socio-economic resilience.
- Cities must also prioritize and build capacity in mainstreaming accessibility and universal design across all government sectors. This can be achieved through an engaged, participatory and multi-stakeholder process of defining main challenges and opportunities, exchanging ideas about possible solutions (at the national and international levels) and developing and utilizing existing resources to make cities more accessible.
- Data is key to identify and address accessibility challenges. Data should not only be disaggregated and provide information about gender, age and disability but it should also come from assessments in direct dialogue and coordination with civil society, which will allow for a more qualitative, in-depth assessment.
- As many services provided during and after the outbreak are and will provided digitally, promoting digital inclusion is key and will dictate the future of equity in cities. In that sense, local authorities must be supported to provide trainings, implement standards, procurement policies, and guidelines to ensure universal accessibility of digital products and services.
Download
the Press Release
Beyond
The Outbreak
Building accessible and inclusive cities requires a conscious effort to understand and effectively address the daily barriers faced by persons with disabilities and older persons. The principle of Universal Design (“the design of products, environments, services and programs to be useable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation”) is a human-centered approach that supports user-friendly and convenient access to goods and services through a full understanding of the users’ needs in terms of usage, convenience and privacy. Universal Designs should be simple, intuitive, flexible and require low physical effort. Needless to say, Universal Design does not only benefit persons with disabilities and older persons, but also the entire community. Cities that apply this principle in the delivery of goods and services, will foster social equity and resilience in cities.
Building
Back Better
The UCLG Decalogue
Resources
For further information on the topic of Accessibility and its impact on cities and regions, please refer to the related resources included below.
- Accessible PDF Policy Paper on Inclusive and Accessible Cities
- Audio version of Policy Paper on Inclusive and Accessible Cities
- Information from Word Enabled series Equity and Access in Times of Pandemic
- Transcript of the session
- Cities for All COVID-19 “Inclusive & Accessible Cities” Pilot Survey
- Transport Justice: Designing Fair Transport Systems
