Wednesday, May 22, 2024 by Chad Swiatecki
Disability advocates in Austin want to make sure major upcoming changes to the local transportation system and housing market don’t exclude people with physical, visual or hearing disabilities.
At a roundtable held Tuesday at the Austin offices of Texas advocacy group ADAPT, leaders involved in Project Connect’s mass transit program and efforts to increase housing density near transit corridors focused specifically on creating affordable housing that is accessible to people with disabilities. Following the recent passage of HOME 2, a proposed land use change that drastically reduces minimum lot sizes, the discussion turned to what the city can do to address the anticipated increased demand for accessible housing.
Jamie May, the Housing Authority’s director of housing and community development, said the city’s incentives for developers are aimed at achieving 5 percent accessibility, and that higher levels can be achieved by the city or other entities buying land near transit stops and building housing tailored to local needs.
“In the properties that we invest in, I think around 5 percent of the properties should be accessible. We know that’s not enough. That’s why we’re currently reviewing our guidelines, working with our contractors to review all the rules and regulations to ensure we’re delivering the benefits that we should be delivering to the community,” he said, referring to industry projections that up to 18 percent of housing stock needs to be accessible.
May also noted progress being made towards equitable, transit-focused development that aims to combine affordability, accessibility and a full range of nearby businesses and lifestyle offerings.
“If we have residential space here and we have transit right next door, if there’s no grocery store within 3.5 miles and it’s not at a transit station, it’s not going to do us any good,” he said. “We need to build complete communities that serve our residents well. We need to make sure people have access to transit, can live close by, and that the built environment serves us well.”
The panel looked at the light rail system planned for Project Connect and discussed the need for all transit stations and their surrounding areas to be designed to be as inclusive as possible, with wayfinding mechanisms to benefit passengers with visual and hearing impairments.
Martin Calaiti, director of systemwide accessibility at the Metropolitan Transportation Authority, said new technologies such as auditory beacons and QR codes, working with tactile features such as patterns in the concrete that lead to the boarding platform, can help reduce friction points for people with disabilities.
“The factors are the width that we need, the height that we need, the slope that we need. Those are all there. The real challenge with accessibility is the footprint around the station, the actual part of it that you need to get to and from the system,” he said. “The opportunities, the challenges, the ideas, the innovations — those will be the work that will be done around the station, within the radius that we think we can work with, design, build and construct.”
Peter Mullan, executive vice president of urban architecture and design for the Austin Transportation Partnership, said the decision to build the light rail system at ground level maximizes accessibility by eliminating the need to use elevators to reach elevated or underground access points.
“From my conversations with people in this room, there’s a realization that there are actually benefits to being on the street — the idea that it makes light rail and public transit more accessible to the public, it reduces the time and energy people spend actually getting to their car, and it really integrates the transit system into the urban fabric,” he said, noting that design considerations such as the visibility of people in wheelchairs crossing roadways at intersections need to be addressed.
Michael Phillips, training supervisor at Austin Lighthouse, said agencies involved in accommodating people with disabilities need to provide intensive training at all levels to expose staff and decision-makers to what it’s like to live without vision or use a wheelchair.
“One thing I’m a little concerned about is relationships. When we bring on new people, we do what we call ‘immersion training’ during their orientation. It doesn’t matter if they’re blind or sighted when they join the company. We blindfold them, teach them how to use a cane, how to walk, and allow them to experience and understand the perspective of a visually impaired person,” he said. “I truly believe that having immersion and sensitivity training for our operators and employees makes them more accessible, more independent and more confident.”
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