Enhanced Accessibility for People with Disabilities Living in Urban Areas

[Excerpt] People with disabilities constitute a significant proportion of the poor in developing countries. If internationally agreed targets on reducing poverty are to be reached, it is critical that specific measures be taken to reduce the societal discrimination and isolation that people with disabilities continue to face. Transport is an important enabler of strategies to fight poverty through enhancing access to education, employment, and social services. This project aims to further the understanding of the mobility and access issues experienced by people with disabilities in developing countries, and to identify specific steps that can be taken to start addressing problems. A major objective of the project is to compile a compendium of guidelines that can be used by government authorities, advocacy groups, and donor/loan agencies to improve the access of people with disabilities to transport and other services in urban areas

Strategies for detecting and controlling electronic gaming vulnerabilities

A growing feature of global gaming expansion is the recognition that developing socially responsible guidelines and infrastructure is essential to enhancing the appeal and credibility of the industry. The current financial uncertainties serve to highlight the need for monitoring at risk players, and especially to consider strategies minimising gambling harm before any who are susceptible become confirmed problem gamblers. Prevention, therefore, lies in the vigilance, adaptability and development of pre-emptive mechanisms in an increasingly high-speed gaming environment

Making touch-based kiosks accessible to blind users through simple gestures

Touch-based interaction is becoming increasingly popular and is commonly used as the main interaction paradigm for self-service kiosks in public spaces. Touch-based interaction is known to be visually intensive, and current non-haptic touch-display technologies are often criticized as excluding blind users. This study set out to demonstrate that touch-based kiosks can be designed to include blind users without compromising the user experience for non-blind users. Most touch-based kiosks are based on absolute positioned virtual buttons which are difficult to locate without any tactile, audible or visual cues. However, simple stroke gestures rely on relative movements and the user does not need to hit a target at a specific location on the display. In this study, a touch-based train ticket sales kiosk based on simple stroke gestures was developed and tested on a panel of blind and visually impaired users, a panel of blindfolded non-visually impaired users and a control group of non-visually impaired users. The tests demonstrate that all the participants managed to discover, learn and use the touch-based self-service terminal and complete a ticket purchasing task. The majority of the participants completed the task in less than 4 min on the first attempt

The relationship between structural game characteristics and gambling behavior: a population-level study

The aim of this study was to examine the relationship between the structural characteristics and gambling behavior among video lottery terminal (VLT) gamblers. The study was ecological valid, because the data consisted of actual gambling behavior registered in the participants natural gambling environment without intrusion by researchers. Online behavioral tracking data from Multix, an eight game video lottery terminal, were supplied by Norsk-Tipping (the state owned gambling company in Norway). The sample comprised the entire population of Multix gamblers (N = 31,109) who had gambled in January 2010. The individual number of bets made across games was defined as the dependent variable, reward characteristics of a game (i.e., payback percentage, hit frequency, size of winnings and size of jackpot) and bet characteristics of a game (i.e., range of betting options and availability of advanced betting options) served as the independent variables. Control variables were age and gender. Two separate cross-classified multilevel random intercepts models were used to analyze the relationship between bets made, reward characteristics and bet characteristics, where the number of bets was nested within both individuals and within games. The results show that the number of bets is positively associated with payback percentage, hit frequency, being female and age, and negatively associated with size of wins and range of available betting options. In summary, the results show that the reward characteristics and betting options explained 27 % and 15 % of the variance in the number of bets made, respectively. It is concluded that structural game characteristics affect gambling behavior. Implications of responsible gambling are discussed

On the role of systems thinking in design and its application to public self-services

This paper uses the paradigm of e-accessibility, and in particular the application of publicly available selfservices in order to demonstrate and discuss the power of a Systems Thinking perspective in Design, and more specifically in the design of services. Our aim is to present some justification as to why employing systems thinking can help designers to identify and acknowledge holistically the dimensions of problem space for which they are required to design. The richness of the approach will be discussed, through some theoretical tenets of systems thinking, such as the use of the emerging properties, and the law of requisite variety, notions of second order cybernetics etc. in the conceptualisation and praxis of design

The development of river-based intermodal transport: the case of Ukraine

It should be noted that the (inland waterway transport) IWT in Ukraine currently is in its infancy in comparison with other land based transport means (rail and road) and with other countries that possess navigable rivers. This paper is an extension of the research initiated by Grushevska and Notteboom (2015) where the concepts of intermediacy and centrality were introduced in order to assess the role of Ukraine in the global and regional transport networks. The list of key obstacles for Ukraine’s intermediacy function included IWT related barriers such as: (i) deficient inland waterway infrastructure, (ii) high IWT costs (fees for bridges, locks etc.) and (iii) pilotage charges. To date the transportation to/from ports is mainly fulfilled by road or by rail based multimodal transport solutions. We present the unutilized potential of Ukrainian IWT that needs to be efficiently exploited for the benefit of the national economy and national transport system. This study intends to enrich the limited academic research on IWT systems in a transition stage, as exemplified by the case of Ukraine

Improving the robustness to input errors on touch-based self-service kiosks and transportation apps

acceptedVersio

White Paper: promoting Design for All and e-Accessibility in Europe.

This White Paper results from the collaboration of Design for All (DfA) and e-Accessibility expert bodies representing the European Union member states [ref: the coordination centres of the national European Design for All e-Accessibility network (EDeAN) in 23 European Union Member States, in this document referred to as NCCs]. The objectives of this White Paper are threefold: (1) to present the current state of affairs of EDeAN, active since 2002 as part of the European Commission’s action line supporting the development of the European Information Society; (2) to outline a roadmap for future initiatives, actively reflecting views of the EDeAN network in specific domains related to DfA, e-Accessibility and e-Inclusion; and (3) to bring forward a set of suggestions and recommendations regarding the activities of the network, aiming to support the creation of a fully inclusive European Information Society. The paper is organised as follows: Section 1 provides a short introduction to DfA and Accessibility in Information Society (IS) and Information Society Technology (IST) developments in Europe. Section 2 provides an overview of policy as well as R&D activities related to DfA and accessibility in IST in Europe. Section 3 briefly describes the role of EDeAN and the new challenges that emerge as a result of the changing European policy environment. Section 4 presents current challenges that emerge in five domains directly related to DfA and accessibility, such as policy and legislation, industry, monitoring and evaluation—benchmarking, standardisation, R&D, and education and training. Finally, Sect. 5 puts forward a number of recommendations with regard to future activities for EDeAN. The contents of this paper reflect results from the open discussion forums supported in the EDeAN website (ref: EDeAN Special Interest Groups, SIGs). The draft paper was written by the EDeAN Secretariat for 2005, FORTH-ICS (Greece), and completed with the support of all NCCs. Support was also provided by the European Commission DG Information Society and Media and by the D4ALLnet project (ref: an EC funded project with the code IST-2001-38833)

Measures to enhance mobility among older people in Scandinavia. A literature review of best practice.

Mobiliteten eller rörligheten för äldre människor är fortfarande ett område under utveckling. Det visar en VTI-studie gällande Norge, Danmark och Sverige där man har studerat äldre personers resande med personbil, kollektivtrafik, cykel, gång och i viss mån även övriga transportmedel som definieras av motoriserade rullstolar, skotrar, mopedbilar, etc. Åtgärder för att öka resandet med kollektivtrafik är på dagordningen i alla tre länderna. Det återstår dock mycket som kan förbättras enligt de forskningsrapporter och utvärderingar som ingått i studien. Exempelvis är mer än 200-300 meter en för lång promenadsträcka till eller från busshållplatsen för många äldre människor och miljön på stationer och hållplatser upplevs av många äldre som obehaglig och stressig. Dessutom bör information före och under resan vara både visuell och hörbar, informationstavlor bör placeras i ögonhöjd, tidtabeller ska vara lätta att läsa och förstå, det ska vara lätt att köpa en biljett och hantera biljettautomater, låggolvsfordon är att föredra, lediga platser ska finnas ombord och föraren ska inte börja köra innan passagerarna har satt sig. Det kan ofta vara små förbättringar som utgör skillnader för dem som reser, till exempel att trottoarer är utan trappor och att det finns bänkar på gångvägen till busshållplatsen. Dessutom handlar strategier och åtgärder för att förbättra kollektivtrafiken inte bara om frågor som tillgängliga fordon, vindskydd och enkla trottoarer vid busshållplatser, utan också om frekvens och rutter i förhållande till resmönstren hos den nya rörliga generationen äldre. Dock är bristen på information och kunskap om kollektivtrafiken ofta utbredd bland äldre människor, vilket resulterar i att de reser mindre än de skulle ha gjort eller avstår helt från att använda kollektivtrafiken. Informationskampanjer skulle kunna samordnas bättre för att möta äldre människors resmönster. Nya sätt att sprida information med den senaste tekniken skulle också kunna organiseras i större utsträckning för att möta behoven hos äldre människor. Egentligen är problemet ibland inte brist på information, utan för mycket information eller fel slags information.The present report is part of a larger project about mobility and its impact on older people\u92s well-being and welfare: Mobile age: The impact of everyday mobility for elderly people\u92s welfare and well-being. The heterogenity of older people is emphasised, not only with respect to physical age but also with respect to the specific resource situation and social context of everyday life. The geographical context of the project is Denmark, Norway and Sweden. The report is a literature review examining and evaluating measures designed to improve the independency of mobility among older people. While a few good examples of \u93best practice\u94 in the Scandinavian area (Denmark, Norway and Sweden) have been highlighted, gaps and weaknesses remain. The areas which are examined in the present report are private car, public transport, cycling, walking and to some extent other transport modes defined by motorized wheelchairs, scooters, four-wheeled mopeds/motorcycles, etc. Measures to increase travel with public transport are on the agenda in all three countries, i.e. accessible vehicles and increased accessibility to the interchanges. Also, often small amendments through the travel route could make difference, such as pavements without stairs and benches on the way to the bus stop. Furthermore, strategies and measures for improving public transport concern not only issues such as accessible vehicles, wind shelters and plain pavements at bus stops, but also frequency and routes in relation to the mobility needs of a new generation of older people. However, lack of information and knowledge about public transport services is often rife among older people, which results in them travelling less than they might have done or shying away completely from using public transport. Information campaigns could be synchronised consciously to meet older people\u92s travel trajectories. New ways of providing information using the latest technology could be found to meet the needs of older people. Actually, sometimes the problem is not lack of information but too much of it or the wrong kind