Challenges and Opportunities of Access and Mobility in Addis Ababa: the Case of people with Motor and Visual Impairments
No Thumbnail Available
Date
2006-06
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Addis Ababa University
Abstract
Urban areas are places where multitudes of diversified group of people inhabit. Among
these groups of people are found people with different impainments. Urban life requires
the provision of di fferent kinds of arrangements to satisfy the different needs of these
diversified residents. However, when different activities and arrangements are organized
in the urban built envirolUnent, urban plrumers often overlook the specialized urban
plalUling needs of people with di ffe rent impairments making life in the urban built
enviromnent challenging for this sector of the urban society. Provisions in terms of
accessible buildings, street designs and transport system that facilitate mobility are of
fundamental importance to disabled persons in order to enjoy quality life.
The principal aim of this paper is to find out the kind and extent of problems that people
with motor and people with visual impairments encounter when trying to use services
rendered in different buildings, while moving in the streets for various purposes and
while using di fferent modes of public transp011. It also tries to find out why different
goverlUllent offices fail to notice di sability issues in the areas of buildings and street
design and public transport. The paper also aims to provide recommendations that can
help different stakeholders to start addressing the problems that people with di sability
face in the urban built enviromnent.
The study focuses on people with motor impairments and the visually impaired and
attempts to find out the specialized needs in the area of urban policies specifically
buildings design, street envirolUnent and the transport system through a survey research.
A total of 200 people with different impairments filled the questionnaires prepared, and
focus group discussions were held to supplement the information obtained. Govermnent
offices participated in filling the questionnaires and personal observation was undertaken
to verify the responses obtained.
Description
Keywords
Opportunities of Access