Improving Transportation Options for Disability Communities
Why you should care about transportation accessibility?
Did you take a bus today?
Did you ride in a car?
What about subway?
Think about how many times you get in a car, take a bus, or use any form of transportation each day.
For people with disabilities, accessible transportation is not something that can be taken for granted. Access to footpaths, ramps, elevators, buses, vans, and rails must meet strict requirements in order to be accessible for people with disabilities.
Unfortunately, America has a long way before achieving fully accessible transportation. Thus, the transportation issue for disability communities should be everyone’s concern.
According to multiple pieces of research, safe, efficient, and accessible transportation is a key component of community integration for people with disabilities. Community integration refers to the extent of involvement, engagement, and participation of an individual in the same manner as the typical citizen in the community. The specific activities of community integration include maintaining a job, going to grocery stores, participating in religious services, etc.
For each member in our society, recognizing where the inaccessibility exists not only strengthens social awareness of the transportation issue, but it also helps to push for legislative and technological changes that benefit people with disabilities.
Therefore, next time you use any mode of transportation, we challenge you to observe if the transportation would be accessible to someone in the disability communities.
We challenge you to write a letter to your congressional representatives and talk about your observations.
We challenge you to do your own research on the issue of accessible transportation–maybe specifically for your hometown.
