accessibility_fail | Recent Entries

The long-term care facility that I'm currently residing in has accessible showers. Correction, with the exception of one shower, the rest of the showers are accessible. The one that isn't so accessible is in the men's room.

Whose bright idea was it to place a toilet two feet directly in front of the shower!? Honestly, how do they expect shower chairs to safely maneuver around a toilet?

Current Mood: bitchy

pauamma

With northern hemisphere summer come sidewalk repairs in northern hemisphere cities. The temporary installations for this one completely fenced off a 30m long section of a sidewalk 2m to 2.5m wide, and further fenced off a section of the street surface about 1m wide. Then, presumably so people in wheelchairs could use the temporary path, they installed ramps. And by "installed ramps", I mean put (on the end I checked) a laminated wood board, resting on the sidewalk edge on one side and with the other edge resting on the street surface. I stepped onto it experimentally, and it perceptibly flexed under my 91kg. I don't know what would happen if someone in a power chair tried to. As it is, I doubt anyone will find out, because the road surface edge of the board is about 40 cm from the fence, leaving (to my untrained eye) way too little clearance to turn and get to the other "ramp" (which I haven't looked at yet). That 40cm clearance also looks too much too narrow to me for someone using a wheelchair to get past the board if they got onto the street surface at the nearby pedestrian crossing, if there's a curb cut there. (There should be, but I can't swear to it.)

I intend to go back there in 2 to 3 hours, take pics, and report it to City Hall as a street hazard. Besides what I mentioned above and the same at the other end, is there anything I missed that should or could usefully go in my report?

ETA: Street surface detour around fenced-off sidewalk, with obstacles to wheelchair use

Street surface detour around fenced-off sidewalk, with obstacles to wheelchair use

picture of one "ramp" and the nearby street surface, with a 30cm shoe for scale, shows clearance between board edge on street surface and fence support base is under 50cm.

pauamma

It must suck to be over 30 cm/1 ft taller than everyone. I'm sorry you lost the coordinates or the gizmo that would return you is broken or whatever happened that left you stranded in ours, I truly am. But right now, I'd be much more sorry if you had remembered to post important signs, like water cutoff in the apartment complex from 9pm-12am tonight, at a height where we would notice them beforehand and be able to read them comfortably - or you know, at all.

pauamma

2022-05-10: entry is now public.

( Summary )

( Personal background )

( Involvement in the FreeBSD contributor community )

( Code of Conduct, violation reporting procedure, and process for dealing with reports )

( Detailed timeline of events )

( My next steps )

ernads

I want to shout out that I wish for death.
I want to cry that's I'm done: no more spoons.
I want to shout that's it's to much, that I can't manage so many fronts.I'm just human.
I want to beg for just a tiny bit acknowledge of my attempt and effort. I want to beg to be judged not only for my numerous tailers.
But. I do not have the energy any more,nor do I have someone who will listen without judgment.
I feel that I am like a blind person who is expectect to read.
I feel that they see only my patterns and illnesses, not as a human being.
I want to ask why the hell was I born at all.
I want to ask why the hell should I fight own,as I keep failing.
I want to fall asleep and not wake up at all.
Peace.Rest.Quite.

pauamma

I had to yell to several of our senators earlier for unrelated reasons, and one has an email address hosted by an outside provider. Turns out the first time you email it, you get an autoreply using the Mailinblack service inviting you to type, in an image with several words, the one that's written in color. So in case you wondered whether someone would make captchas less accessible than they already were, the answer is yes.

(No advice needed - I'm not colorblind myself, it just infuriates me on behalf of any of their constituents who may be.)

azurelunatic

I went to the doctor for a semi-routine physical yesterday. There are three entrances to the family practice wing: the main entrance, shared with the hospital, the north entrance at ground level (with a pair of immediately adjacent accessible parking spots), and the third floor entrance on the north end, connected from the parking garage (with a pair of accessible parking spots on each floor next to the elevator).

I usually park on the third floor near the elevator and entrance. I don't have a disabled plate or hang tag, so I park as near as I can get otherwise. When I approached the third floor entrance, there was a sign on the door saying it was closed. The same sign was on the ground level entrance. I had to walk all the way around to the front entrance. I saw some people with worse mobility than mine struggling their way across the parking lot.

There was no signage anywhere except on the doors, and that seemed to not have any Braille attached, and was in small enough font that I had to get within about ten feet of the door to read the sign.

Reception in my GP's office have been asking for better signage from day one, but have not yet got it.

There should be:
* Parking lot signs saying the only entrance is the main one
* A laminated informational sign at each accessible parking spot which is not adjacent to the main door
* A large, very distant-readable sign on each closed door in addition to the detailed signs
* Changes to pre-appointment check-in email saying that the only open entrance is the main one
* Signs at each parking garage elevator
* Information accessible in other languages besides English, and for blind people

gingicat

A local staffing agency expects my friend with advanced keratoconus to be able to use this for her job interview:

Montage Live by Montage Talent, Inc.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/montage-live/id1036399811?mt=8

She’s not going to be able to make eye contact if she has to keep holding the phone up to her eyeball to see the buttons!

Current Mood: angry

jazzyjj

Hi folks. I'm back with some more questions regarding ADA paratransit. First off, does anyone happen to know if the powers-that-be keep records of any kind regarding disabilities of paratransit riders in a given locale? This question may seem on the surface to be a bit confidential, but here's why I'm asking. Several weeks ago I was told that my requests for door-to-door assistance are not that common. I took that to mean nobody or hardly anyone in my area needs the drivers to actually get out of their vehicles and assist people to said vehicles, provided passengers aren't standing outside specifically waiting for their ride. A few weeks ago when I booked a round trip, I didn't let the reservationist know that I needed door-to-door assistance until she was about to give me the estimated pick-up time, and she informed me that she was going to have to reschedule my trip. Just for needing door-to-door assistance but not specifying that at the correct time. On a related note, do any of you paratransit riders have the option of scheduling online and creating a profile? This would be so much easier. I'd rather not have to specify my exact needs every single time. I used to not mind doing this, but now I'd really prefer not to repeat myself if at all possible. I'm wondering if this may somehow be confusing the dispatchers? A lot of the paratransit vehicles here nowadays seem to be hybrids, which inandof itself is not a problem with me. However, I have difficulty hearing these hybrids with all the other traffic. This can present quite the dilemma when one only has light perception. Update: The local bus company rolled out an online portal about a year ago. The good news is that it is accessible at least with the 2 screen readers I'm currently using. But the bad news--or perhaps somewhat bad--is that it is not currently possible to book trips online. I read that trips can be cancelled online, but I haven't found a way to do that yet.

Current Mood: confused
Current Location: just returned from a neighbor's place across the hall.
Current Music: theme from the Winter Olympics.

jazzyjj

Hello everybody. Well, just when my parents and I and other team members thought that the local paratransit service couldn't get any better, the following scenario happened about a week ago. I have started working out again at the local YMCA, but this time with one of the newer staff members here. He is a very good worker, and a good guy too. So on this particular morning I was picked up by paratransit per my request. The bus pulled up right in front of me, and the driver opened the door and guided me on board. I was his only passenger for that trip, so he dropped me off inside the Y like I had requested. Actually I was informed during my workout that the driver had somehow missed the Y and managed to circle the entire block. Then toward the end of the workout, my tutor told me that we had to go downstairs and meet my ride home. Well, we did so and were promptly informed by one of the front-desk people that my bus had left a few moments prior to our arrival downstairs. So my tutor and I thanked them, and he ended up driving me home. When I got back to my apartment and checked my answering machine, there was a message from the local bus company from a few minutes prior to my arrival back at the pad. The message said that my bus was waiting for me. The time of the message was about 10 minutes before my scheduled pick-up time at the Y. Yet I had my cell phone on me all that time, and it was turned on. Absolutely no phone calls.

Fast-forward to a couple days ago. I phoned into the reservation line to try and schedule a round trip for yesterday, which was Tuesday. But they gave me a time which was way before I would've even gotten out of bed, and told me that no other times were available. So I guess our paratransit service is having issues yet again, and that they're back to their old tricks. I was actually talking with another driver a few weeks ago, who admitted to me that the dispatchers suck at their job. This was what I thought all along, since I've had issues with the service before. This same thing happened just today when I tried to schedule a round trip on paratransit for tomorrow. So I am taking a taxicab to the YMCA, and one back and hopefully things will go smoother.

Current Mood: aggravated
Current Location: in my apartment.

jazzyjj

Hi everybody. Subject line pretty much sums it up. I'm wondering if anyone could test out the following website for accessibility: http://www.afb.org . I realize that this is probably a loaded request, especially given that accessibility means different things to different people. However, I've been having some issues with some parts of the website and am wondering if other people also experience these issues. I have been trying to purchase a free course from the AFB eLearning Center with no luck. It seems that this site is logging me out constantly, unless I tick the box that says "Remember My Username and Password." Even then, I am sometimes automatically logged out. Please see a prior entry of mine in this comm. I realize this is probably a security measure to protect against spammers and so forth, but the frequency with which it happens seems to be much greater than on other sites. The other issue I'm having is with the online store. It seems that, with VoiceOver at least, the navigation is somewhat off. It wraps around in a loop, but just a few days ago I was able to read a bit of information that was not accessible to me before. For the most part this website with its accompanying portals seems to work pretty well with VoiceOver and the latest version of Chromevox Classic, but I've not had good luck contacting the admins. Thanks in advance for anybody's assistance with this.

Current Mood: surprised
Current Location: bachelor pad, Illinois.

avendya

Does anyone have a larger version of the

accessibility_fail profile picture? (Wheelchair user symbol, but with added cutlass.)

I am feeling the need to make a sign version for my next protest.

vass

Anyone here with a Wikipedia account and enough spoons for a fight feel like editing the migraine page so it does not include a flashing image that is a migraine trigger?

I'd do it myself but I, um, have a headache and cannot deal with the research and gearing up for a fight in the talk pages that this might entail.

The trigger image is the one of a scintillating scotoma.

Current Mood: sick

jazzyjj

Hello everybody. Subject line is pretty accurate. I'm wondering if any of you have ever come across website forms that just time out after only a short interval? Just a couple of days ago my father and I attempted to register on our preferred bank's website. I had previously read an article elsewhere online which highly praises this bank's accessibility efforts. So my father and I both had our computers handy, and we went to our bank's site and began the registration process. I should state here that I had an account with them before not online, so some of my information needed to be updated. But the form kept on timing out, and we had to call their customer service department. It all worked out in the end and it turns out that their website is very accessible at least on the Mac with VoiceOver, but it seems that some of the forms on there in addition to sign-up are timed. I think I'm going to email their accessibility team about this, but thought I'd also post about it here.

Current Mood: accomplished

jazzyjj

Good morning/afternoon/evening all! I came across the following post just yesterday on another website and I'm wondering what y'all think? I don't know about anyone else here, but to me what this guy is proposing needs to be given some more thought. Judging from past works of his I believe he is a hard-core member of the National Federation of the Blind, which split with the American Council of the Blind back in the early 1960's. If memory serves, the ACB's historical account of the split into 2 separate organizations is still available from their website http://www.acb.org . I actually read that book several years ago in audio format, and it presented some truly harsh facts about the situation. I'm pasting a link to the forum topic. http://applevis.com/forum/accessibility-advocacy/proposal-applevis-accessibility-advocacy-assistant .

For whatever reason I can't get a shortened URL to this, so if it doesn't work just try copying and pasting. I've been strongly convinced for years that this type of thinking is exactly what is hindering a lot of our nation's disability advocacy.

Current Mood: worried

roserodent

I spoke to my bank today about a website access problem, and they told me the only way to sort out the issue was to be called on a landline phone (don't have one) by an automated service. I told them this is a problem for anyone who is Deaf and would they at least do it for me in the branch. No. They will know my access number, that is not secure. But it's all ok as there's a special feature for deaf callers... At the end of the call it asks you to press 1 if you didn't hear it and it will ask you again.

The mind positively boggles!

I told her best case scenario a phone call goes "flub flub flubbety flub wub" and worst case it goes "[tumbleweed]" and this was genuinely surprising to her.

This is a variant of the tax office which has an AUDIO message on their text phone line saying press 1 if you are deaf...

jazzyjj

Hi everyone. I haven't posted to this comm for a little bit but I have a question. I recently got my ADA paratransit re-certification notice in the mail, and I've honestly been debating what exactly to do about it. Every other time I've gotten one of these, I just went ahead with the whole re-certification process. I wasn't too happy about that, but I did it anyway. But now that state funding has gotten so out of hand, I'm totally giving up on paratransit. So earlier this afternoon I phoned the local paratransit certification folks, and spoke with somebody who actually seemed at first to know what she was doing. However, when I asked her my question and she kept putting me on hold, it became quite clear to me that she had absolutely no clue. Hence my reason for asking here. Is it absolutely, 100% necessary for one to re-certify for ADA paratransit even if they are going to only ride the fixed-route buses and the trains? I don't have very good independent travel skills anymore, which in part is a discussion for another time. Actually I posted about this over at the Disabled Rage comm, so anyone interested please feel free to go there and have a look. I also posted an earlier entry here regarding this. But anyway, whenever I travel outdoors I need somebody with me who has good eyeballs. There are a couple exceptions, but I generally can no longer travel outdoors independently. My directional navigation isn't that great anymore either, so I don't want to ride paratransit. I have been asked by drivers to give directions to where I was going, and I never felt comfortable doing that unless someone I know well was riding with me. I would carry along maps, but I think that's a whole other can of worms. I have a cell phone and am happy to call somebody if I get lost, but then the problem becomes telling that person where I am at the time I'm lost.

Current Mood: perplexed.
Current Location: keeping warm in the bachelor pad.

zdashamber

I'm going to give a five-minute presentation tomorrow evening on basic web accessibility (what to do re: designing and developing a website)... Here are the slides: https://slides.com/madelinebernard/webaccessibility

I'm interested in taking feedback on it, if you have any!

roserodent

Good news, a win for access, a local community facility has installed automatic doors.

Erm... sadly they have installed them outside the existing manual doors to "stop the new doors letting in a draft because they're so big". So the automatic doors can take you almost 6 feet then you must open a manual door which pulls towards the automatic door, which is now in the way and will not close until you pass through the manual door.

Oh the thought process. I suggest "Door 101: using them to get from outside to inside"