As part of our advocacy, #OneAccessibility, we will share information about differently able and profile one location with accessible trails. Look out every week for this enlightening post.
“Just because a man lacks the use of his eyes doesn’t mean he lacks vision.” – Stevie Wonder
Navigating around an unfamiliar area can be a bit scary for anyone, but it is especially for people with visual impairment : without the usual visual clues or landmarks, it quickly gets tricky and even sometimes dangerous to find your way around. In some cities, pedestrians are often forced off of sidewalks that are cluttered with vendors, animals and other obstacles.
Hopefully to help blind and partially sighted people, footpaths, stairs and train platforms can be covered with Tactile Paving. Never heard of it? If you live in one of these countries, initiatives -more or less successful- have already been undertaken in urban areas : Canada, Mexico, United States, China, Hong Kong, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, India, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, France, The Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Turkey, United Kingdom.
Tactile Paving units are like braille for pavements : these raised bumps and ridges help guide people down sidewalks and across intersections, providing distinctive surface patterns for different situations and warning them of potential hazards. You can feel them underfoot or with a long cane. They give the confidence to travel safely and independently.
One of the pioneers of this system was Japan in 1967. They experimented with many types of patterns and textures, sometimes resulting in confusing situations for both the visually impaired and for the elderly! This led to the standardisation of the system, with reliable design rules that can be applied and understood the same way everywhere. United Kingdom, United States and Australia followed the trend in the 90’s, and the system rapidly spread throughout the world. However consistency is a challenge some cities are still struggling with it.
Let’s have a look at some of the patterns and their meanings!
- Stripes along a path means a safe route to follow :
- Stripes across a path means there’s some steps ahead :
- Offset dots indicate the edge of a train platform :
- As bright contrasting colors remain a good way to distinguish patterns, red for instance is used to indicate crossing with lights, or at least something that will stop the traffic :
Some countries provide guidelines for their tactile paving :
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United States with ADA Accessibility Guidelines, Detectable Warnings: here
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United Kingdom with Guidance on the Use of Tactile Paving Surfaces (Department of the Environment, Transport and the Regions, 1998): here
Tell us how your streets are designed for people with visual impairment!
Do you have a question, suggestion or contribution? Feel free to comment below.
Accessibility Uncovered 
is a weekly enlightening series of posts to share information about people with disabilities and how accessibility can improve lives across the world. We shall also profile accessible buildings and public places identified during accessibility meetups. An initiative of the Accessibility team
Read last week’s round up here
See the list of all articles here
