Accessibility

Accessibility is a general term used to describe the degree to which a product, device, service, or environment is accessible by as many people as possible. Accessibility can be viewed as the "ability to access" and possible benefit of some system or entity. Accessibility is often used to focus on people with disabilities and their right of access to entities, often through use of assistive technology.

Accessibility is not to be confused with usability which is used to describe the extent to which a product (e.g., device, service, environment) can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction in a specified context of use.

Accessibility is strongly related to universal design when the approach involves "direct access". This is about making things accessible to all people (whether they have a disability or not). An alternative is to provide "indirect access" by having the entity support the use of a person's assistive technology to achieve access (e.g., the screen reader).

Disabilities

The disability rights movement advocates equal access to social, political, and economic life which includes not only physical access but access to the same tools, services, organizations and facilities which we all pay for.

While it is often used to describe facilities or amenities to assist people with disabilities, as in "wheelchair accessible", the term can extend to Braille signage, wheelchair ramps, elevators, audio signals at pedestrian crossings, walkway contours, website design, reading accessibility, and so on.

Various countries have legislation requiring physical accessibility which are (in order of enactment):

In the US, under the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, new public and private business construction generally must be accessible. Existing private businesses are required to increase the accessibility of their facilities when making any other renovations in proportion to the cost of the other renovations. The U.S. Access Board is "A Federal Agency Committed to Accessible Design for People with Disabilities." The Job Accommodation Network discusses accommodations for people with disabilities in the workplace. Many states in the US have their own disability laws.
In Australia, Disability Discrimination Act 1992 has numerous provisions for accessibility.
In the UK, the Disability Discrimination Act 1995 has numerous provisions for accessibility.
In South Africa The Promotion of Equality and the Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act 2000 has numerous provisions for accessibility.
In Ontario, Canada, the Ontarians with Disabilities Act of 2001 is meant to "improve the identification, removal and prevention of barriers faced by persons with disabilities..."

Transportation

In transportation, accessibility refers to the ease of reaching destinations. People who are in places that are highly accessible can reach many other activities or destinations quickly, people in inaccessible places can reach many fewer places in the same amount of time.

A measure that is often used is to measure accessibility in a traffic analysis zone i is:

$Accessibility_{i}=\sum _{j}{Opportunities_{j}}\times f\left({C_{ij}}\right)$ where:

$i$ = index of origin zones
$j$ = index of destination zones
$f\left({C_{ij}}\right)$ = function of generalized travel cost (so that nearer or less expensive places are weighted more than farther or more expensive places).

For a non-motorized mode of transport, such as walking or cycling, the generalized travel cost may include additional factors such as safety or gradient.

Automobile accessibility also refers to ease of use by disabled people.

Accessibility planning

In the United Kingdom, the Department for Transport have mandated that each local authority produce an Accessibility Plan that is incorporated in their Local Transport Plan. An Accessibility Plan sets out how each local authority plans to improve access to employment, learning, health care, food shops and other services of local importance, particularly for disadvantaged groups and areas. Accessibility targets are defined in the accessibility plans, these are often the distance or time to access services by different modes of transport including walking, cycling and public transport.

Accessibility Planning was introduced as a result of the report "Making the Connections: Final Report on Transport and Social Exclusion" ^[1]. This report was the result of research carried out by the Social Exclusion Unit. The United Kingdom also has a "code of practice" for making train and stations accessible: "Accessible Train and Station Design for Disabled People: A Code of Practice" ^[2]. This code of practice was first published in 2002 with the objective of compliance to Section 71B of the Railways Act 1993, and revised after a public consultation period in 2008.

Low floor

"Low floor" redirects here

A significant development in transportation, and public transport in particular, to achieve accessibility, is the move to "low-floor" vehicles. In a low-floor vehicle, access to part or all of the passenger cabin is unobstructed from one or more entrances by the presence of steps, enabling easier access for the infirm or people with push chairs. A further aspect may be that the entrance and corridors are wide enough to accommodate a wheelchair. Low-floor vehicles have been developed for buses, trolleybuses and trams.

A low floor in the vehicular sense is normally combined in a conceptual meaning with normal pedestrian access from a standard kerb height. However, the accessibility of a low-floor vehicle can also be utilised from slightly raising portions of kerb at bus stops, or through use of level boarding bus rapid transit 'stations' or tram stops. The combination of access from a kerb was the technological development of the 1990s, as step-free interior layouts for buses had existed in some cases for decades, with entrance steps being introduced as chassis designs and overall height regulations changed.

Low-floor buses may also be designed with special height adjustment controls that permit a stationary bus to temporarily lower itself to ground level, permitting wheelchair access. This is referred to as a kneeling bus.

At rapid transit systems, vehicles generally have floors in the same height as the platforms but the stations are often underground or elevated, so accessibility there isn't a question of providing low-floor vehicles, but providing a step-free access from street level to the platforms (generally by elevators, which are somewhere restricted to disabled passengers only, so that the step-free access isn't obstructed by healthy people taking advantage).

Housing

Most existing and new housing, even in the wealthiest nations, lack basic accessibility features unless the designated, immediate occupant of a home currently has a disability. However, there are some initiatives to change typical residential practices so that new homes incorporate basic access features such as zero-step entries and door widths adequate for wheelchairs to pass through. Occupational Therapists are a professional group skilled in the assessment and making of recommendations to improve access to homes.^[3] They are involved in both the adaptation of existing housing to improve accessibility,^[4] and in the design of future housing.^[5]

Great Britain applies the most widespread application of home access to date. In 1999, Parliament passed Section M, an amendment to residential building regulations requiring basic access in all new homes.^[6] In the United States, the 1988 Amendments to the Fair Housing Act added people with disabilities, as well as familial status, to the classes already protected by law from discrimination (race, color, gender, religion, creed, and country of origin). Among the protection for people with disabilities in the 1988 Amendments are seven construction requirements for all multifamily buildings of more than four units first occupied after March 13, 1991. These seven requirements are as follows:^[7]

An accessible building entrance on an accessible route,
Accessible common and public use areas,
Doors usable by a person in a wheelchair,
Accessible route into and through the dwelling unit,
Light switches, electrical outlets, thermostats and other environmental controls in accessible locations,
Reinforced walls in bathrooms for later installation of grab bars, and
Usable kitchens and bathrooms.

Access is typically defined within the limits of what a person sitting in a wheelchair is able to reach with arm movement only, with minimal shifting of the legs and torso. Lighting and thermostat controls should not be above and power outlets should not be below the reach of a wheelchair-bound person.

Sinks and cooking areas typically need to be designed without cupboards below them, to permit the legs of the wheelchair user to roll underneath, and countertops may be of reduced height to accommodate a sitting rather than standing user. In some cases two food preparation areas may be combined into a single kitchen to permit both standing and wheelchair users.

In spite of these advancements, the housing types where most people in the United States reside —single-family homes—are not covered by the Americans with Disabilities Act, the Fair Housing Act, or any other federal law with the exception of the small percentage of publicly-funded homes impacted by Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act. As a result, the great majority of new single-family homes replicate the barriers in existing homes.

The broad concept of Universal Design is relevant to housing, as it is to all aspects of the built environment. Furthermore, a Visitability movement begun by grass roots disability advocates in the 1980s focuses specifically on changing construction practices in new housing. This movement, a network of interested people working in their locales, works on educating, passing laws, and spurring voluntary home access initiatives with the intention that basic access become a routine part of new home construction.

Adaptations and accommodations

Many ranch style homes and manufactured homes utilize a main floor slightly raised above ground level, but have an overall flat layout with either a crawlspace or slightly raised basement below for plumbing, electrical, and heating systems. These homes can be relatively easily modified to accommodate wheelchairs and walkers, with the installation of a long low-rise ramp outside the building, up to the house entrance, placed over the existing stairway. This ramp can then be removed at a later time, reverting back to the stairway entrance if the handicapped access is no longer necessary.

Split level homes tend to be designed with multiple internal stairways and half-floor landings inside the building. There may be an entrance area inside the building at ground level, with stairs inside the entrance that immediately go up and down from the ground level. These homes are difficult to accommodate inexpensively since there is often no space available inside the structure to install long sloping wheelchair ramps to access the various floors. It may be possible to retrofit stair lifts into the stairwells or wheelchair lifts into balconies near the stairwell.

Multi-story homes can sometimes be accommodated by installing a private residential elevator, which is usually much less expensive and has fewer design and layout requirements than a full commercial elevator. Homebuilders can in some cases plan for a future residential elevator by designing closet spaces in each floor stacked vertically with the same dimensions and location. At a later time the closet floors and ceilings are removed and the elevator equipment is installed into the open shaft.

Telecommunications and IT access

Another dimension of accessibility is the ability to access information and services by minimizing the barriers of distance and cost as well as the usability of the interface. In many countries this has led to initiatives, laws and regulations that aim toward providing universal access to the internet and to phone systems at reasonable cost to citizens.

Currently there are a few major movements to coordinate a set of guidelines for accessibility for the web. The first and most well known is The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI), which is part of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). This organization developed the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 1.0 which explains how to make Web content accessible to people with disabilities. Web "content" generally refers to the information in a Web page or Web application, including text, images, forms, sounds, and such. (More specific definitions are available in the WCAG documents.)^[8]

The WCAG is separated into 3 levels of compliance, A, AA and AAA. Each level requires a stricter set of conformance guidelines, such as different versions of HTML (Transitional vs Strict) and other techniques that need to be incorporated into your code before accomplishing validation. Online tools such as the Watchfire WebXACT engine or the imergo Web Compliance Manager will allow users to submit their website and automatically run it through the WCAG guidelines and produce a report, stating whether or not they conform to each level of compliance. Adobe Dreamweaver also offers plugins which allow web developers to test these guidelines on their work from within the program.

Another source of web accessibility guidance comes from the US government. Section 508 of the US Rehabilitation Act is a comprehensive set of rules designed to help web designers make their sites accessible. The U.S. General Services Administration have also developed a website where one can take online training courses for free to learn about these rules^[9].

In general, for a website to comply with accessibility standards, they should at least have the following:

(X)HTML Validation from the W3C for the pages content
CSS Validation from the W3C for the pages layout
At least WAI-AA (preferably AAA) compliance with the WAI's WCAG
Compliance with all guidelines from Section 508 of the US Rehabilitation Act
Access keys built into the HTML
Semantic Web Markup
A high contrast version of the site for individuals with low vision
Alternative media for any multimedia used on the site (video, flash, audio, etc)

Another good idea is for websites to include a web accessibility statement on the site. This page details the accessible status of the page, lists access keys and can display which validations have been achieved for the site as well as include their pledge for accessibility. Example of an accessibility statement

Meeting and conference access

Meetings and conferences should consider the needs of all of their participants. Checklists such as this may make it easier to identify specific needs:

Mobility access

Wheelchair accessible transportation
Reserved parking
Barrier-free meeting rooms / restrooms / podium/speaker's platform
Handicap accessible lodging

Hearing access

Advance copies of papers
An assistive listening system
Sign language interpreters
A quiet place to gather for social conversation (a quieter space that is still visible to others should be reserved at social events or dinners so that people who are hard of hearing may go there to talk with their colleagues.)
TTY access or Internet-based TRS

Sight access

Large print/braille copies of the program and papers
A student volunteer to guide and describe the artwork, computer work, etc.
A tech to help with assistive devices and screen readers (e.g., JAWS reader)
Gloves to touch three dimensional work (where permissible)

Other issues

Notification if social events include flashing lights and noises (these can cause seizures, so either avoid them or announce them ahead of time).
Notices asking participants to refrain from allergy-producing problems (e.g., perfumes)
Inform food providers of food allergies (e.g., peanuts, shellfish, etc.)
Referral information for local personal care attendant agencies
Referral information for veterinarian care for service animals
Access to a place to rest during the day (if the conference venue is far from the lodgings)

Test accessibility

Test accessibility is defined as the extent to which a test and its constituent item set eliminates barriers and permits the test-taker to demonstrate his or her knowledge of the tested content. Test accessibility involves an interaction between features of the test and individual test-taker characteristics.

With the passage of the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, student accountability in essential content areas such as reading, mathematics, and science has become a major area of focus in educational reform. As a result, test developers have needed to create tests to ensure all students, including those with special needs (e.g., students identified with disabilities), are given the opportunity to demonstrate the extent to which they have mastered the content measured on state assessments. Currently, states are permitted to develop two different types of tests in addition to the standard grade-level assessments to target students with special needs. First, the alternate assessment may be used to report proficiency for up to 1% of students in a state. Second, new regulations permit the use of alternate assessments based on modified academic achievement standards to report proficiency for up to 2% of students in a state.

To ensure these new tests generate results that permit valid inferences about student performance, they must be accessible to as many individuals as possible. The Test Accessibility and Modification Inventory (TAMI)^[10] and its companion evaluation tool, the Accessibility Rating Matrix (ARM), were designed to facilitate the evaluation of tests and test items with a focus on enhancing their accessibility. Both instruments integrate principles of accessibility theory and were guided by research on universal design, assessment accessibility, cognitive load theory, and research on item-writing and test development. The TAMI is a non-commercial instrument that has been made available to all state assessment directors and testing companies. Assessment researchers have used the ARM to conduct accessibility reviews of state assessment items for several state departments of education.

References

^ Office of the Deputy Prime Minister - Social Exclusion Unit: "Making the Connections: Final Report on Transport and Social Exclusion". February 2003.
^ Department of Transport & Transport Scotland: "Accessible Train and Station Design for Disabled People: A Code of Practice". July 2008.
^ Occupational therapy research on assistive technology and physical environmental issues: A literature review, Fange et al. (2006), Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy
^ Changes in accessibility and usability in housing: an exploration of the housing adaptation process (2005), Fange and Iwarsson, Occupational Therapy International
^ Accessibility and usability in housing: construct validity and implications for research and practice (2003), Fange and Iwarsson, Disability and Rehabilitation
^ "Doors to Be Swept Away in New Rules for Builders", Rachel Kelley, The Times, December 5, 1997.
^ Fair Housing First, a website sponsored by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
^ WAI Resources on Introducing Web Accessibility
^ Section 508: 508 Training.
^ http://peabody.vanderbilt.edu/tami.xml

Research Studies about Accessible Technology - Microsoft Corporation and Forrester Research, Inc.
Accessibility from the Bartiméus Accessibility Foundation

External links

[1] Office of the Deputy Prime Minister - Social Exclusion Unit: "Making the Connections: Final Report on Transport and Social Exclusion". February 2003.

[2] Department of Transport & Transport Scotland: "Accessible Train and Station Design for Disabled People: A Code of Practice". July 2008.

[3] Occupational therapy research on assistive technology and physical environmental issues: A literature review, Fange et al. (2006), Canadian Journal of Occupational Therapy

[4] Changes in accessibility and usability in housing: an exploration of the housing adaptation process (2005), Fange and Iwarsson, Occupational Therapy International

[5] Accessibility and usability in housing: construct validity and implications for research and practice (2003), Fange and Iwarsson, Disability and Rehabilitation

[6] "Doors to Be Swept Away in New Rules for Builders", Rachel Kelley, The Times, December 5, 1997.

[7] Fair Housing First, a website sponsored by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.

[8] WAI Resources on Introducing Web Accessibility

[9] Section 508: 508 Training.

[10] ttp://peabody.vanderbilt.edu/tami.xml

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