A Critical Question with Judy Shanley & Claire Stanley

SPECIAL FEATURE

Judy Shanley Claire Stanley

Project Director National Office of Easterseals Public Policy Analyst National Disability Rights Network

Where do you find the biggest gap between how transportation planners view the world and how non-planners perceive mobility and accessibility in their everyday lives?

Claire Stanley: The orientation and mobility, training, that I went through when I was younger, it’s now not enough, because there are different new designs that cause you to scratch your head and go – okay what new training do we need that is going to be effective enough, because some of these new designs are just so outside of the box. For example, a specific example that comes to mind are floating bus stops and the new way cities are setting bus systems to interact with bike lanes. With your traditional fourway intersection, there are different little islands that you crossover and a lot of times what’s in between them is a bike lane. Instead of just crossing the street, I’m on the other corner and might have to cross a bike lane crossover to some kind of floating island. However, that bike lane between the islands makes it really hard for people with all kinds of disabilities, and I am speaking here specifically for the blind community, of which I am a member. Depending on the orientation and mobility training, design features like these make it really hard for us to navigate and interact with our communities. And so, when planners are trying to create really new fancy things that I’m sure are all about interacting with pedestrians and cyclists - and I think they have really good intentions - they’re actually making it so much more complicated for blind individuals in particular. I think the city planners had this great intention behind these new plans, but they often forget people with disabilities. We’re kind of an afterthought. Judy Shanley: I agree with you wholeheartedly. One of the things that I think is different between transportation planners and people that have to utilize the service, particularly individuals with disabilities, is planners think about

efficiency. They think about getting from point A to point B and what you’ve talked about in terms of floating bus stops is similar to flag stops. Agencies put in flag stops, where the person on the side of the road has to motion to a bus or a fixed route service to stop or train. For the transit planner, sure, it’s efficient to keep that vehicle running but for an individual with a disability, how do you access that ride when you can’t see the vehicle coming? I think that planners think about efficiency, whereas riders may think about the quality of service and the implications of that service and their impact on accessing opportunities like a doctor’s appointment or going to school. Transportation planners are very analytical and quantitative, and I think the riding public is thinking about the quality of the service and the implications on an individual’s life when that transportation service is challenged. I agree with what Claire said about the new mobility and new innovation and design, that it’s added in without thinking about the implications for various riders. I think that’s the difference in the way transportation planners and nonplanners perceive mobility and accessibility in their everyday lives. Claire Stanley: That’s so interesting, too, because I always wonder - not just in city planning, but all kinds of different areas of design - for people who are going to school, whether you’re an architect or urban developer, I often hear from people in these programs that they’re not getting classes and education on how to make things ADA compliant or user friendly. And that boggles my mind. I’m like, we’re in 2022 and this isn’t part of the curriculum? Because it would make such a big impact on making things accessible. Judy Shanley: Exactly – I just finished a study under my FTA-funded project, the National Center for Mobility Management, where I queried university programs for planners to ask them what they are teaching. In their curriculum, very few indicated that there was any coursework that future professionals had in their programs about ADA accessibility and mobility management. And that’s what ultimately hurts the discipline. On another note, public agencies like the Metropolitan Planning Council in Chicago have developed a report on universal mobility in which they have highlighted that educating transportation planners whether in school or in the profession about universal mobility can help create a lot of awareness as well as opportunity.

Cover image: Wider aisles on passenger rail mean people using wheelchairs can move freely instead of essentially being stuck in one spot (National Disability Rights Network)

Expanded Content

podcast

Continue the conversation with Claire and Judy in our “Critical Conversations: The State of Transportation Planning in 2022” podcast series, available at planning.org/podcast or wherever you get your podcasts.

➡ https://planning.org/podcast/

Judy Shanley

Judy Shanley is a Project Director with the National Office of Easterseals in Chicago. She manages projects funded by the Federal Transit Administration (FTA), the National Science Foundation, and the Federal Highway Administration. The focus of this work is on mobility management, coordinated transportation systems, health, and human service transit partnerships.

Claire Stanley

Claire Stanley is a Public Policy Analyst at the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN). Prior to her position with NDRN, Claire worked as an advocate with the American Council of the Blind where she advocated for the rights of blind and visually impaired persons, both on a direct level as well as on Capitol Hill. As a person with a disability, Ms. Stanley believes strongly in the rights of all persons with disabilities.