Improving the built environment for manual wheelchair users: A review

Abstract

The aim of Universal Design is to make the built environment accessible to all people regardless of disability. This is a laudable aim, but most people are unaware of the many barriers manual wheelchair users actually face when accessing the built environment. The main challenges for manual wheelchair users arise from three areas. Firstly, there are intrinsic limitations arising from the manual wheelchair user's condition and capability. Secondly, there are features such as ramps and cross slopes in the built environment that fail to comply with building codes relating to wheelchair access. Thirdly, there are cosmetic features such as cracked paths, obstructions and poorly placed signage that place an additional burden on manual wheelchair navigation. Each of these three areas is discussed in this article. The intrinsic limitations of user condition and capability include a wide range of physical impairments and an inherently inefficient manual wheelchair propulsion mechanism. The typical code compliance requirements for wheelchair access in the built environment range from limitations on minimum path widths to maximum permissible ramp slopes. However, even when these features comply with code requirements they may be compromised by temporary obstructions or by poor maintenance so that they become insurmountable challenges to manual wheelchair users. An understanding of these challenges is necessary to improve the built environment so that it is more accessible to manual wheelchair users in the future.