An Adapted Wayfinding System for Pedestrians with Cognitive Disabilities

This paper presents a novel wayfinding system adapted to people with cognitive disabilities. It adapts to the user in terms of route calculation, instructions delivery, and interface design. To do so, the system divides the calculated route into atomic instructions and uses street-level photographs at the decision points. To evaluate this approach, we compared it with a commercial navigation application on a field trial with a sample of users (N = 18). From the evaluation, we concluded that our system improves users' performance in terms of the number who reached the destination and were able to identify it correctly.This work has been partially funded by Projects "e-Training y e-Coaching para la Integracion Socio-Laboral" (TIN2013-44586--R) and "eMadrid-CM: Investigacion y Desarrollo de Tecnologias Educativas en la Comunidad de Madrid" (S2013/ICE-2715)

A pathway to independence : wayfinding systems which adapt to a visually impaired person's context

Despite an increased amount of technologies and systems designed to address the navigational requirements of the visually impaired community of approximately 7.4 million in Europe, current research has failed to sufficiently address the human issues associated to their design and use. As more types of sensing technologies are developed to facilitate visually impaired travellers for different navigational purposes (local vs. distant and indoor vs. outdoor), an effective process of synchronisation is required. This synchronisation is represented through context-aware computing, which allows contextual information to not just be sensed (like most current wayfinding systems), but also adapted, discovered and augmented. In this paper, three user studies concerning the suitability of different types of navigational information for visually impaired and sighted people are described. For such systems to be effective, human cognitive maps, models and intentions need to be the focus of further research, in order to provide information that is tailored to a user's task, situation or environment. Methodologies aimed at establishing these issues need to be demonstrated through a multidisciplinary framework

City Tells:

City Tells. Guidelines to an Emotional Wayfinding System were developed to provide wayfinding information to visitors walking through historic environments and to ensure that unknown urban places become more welcoming, easier to navigate and more enjoyable for both visitors and tourists

Wayfinding In Warrenton

This research helps to inform and establish a wayfinding signage system throughout the Town of Warrenton. A wayfinding system can help connect people to places using the built environment and serves as an easily understandable visual guide. Establishing a wayfinding system will help the Town create a cohesive branding, achieve cohesive gateways, while also helping to establish the five character districts that were introduced in the most recent comprehensive plan. This study included a wayfinding audit, which helped to establish the existing conditions and recommend the following the goals: Establish an advisory board to advise the Town on wayfinding decisions that support local business and visitor experience. Create a sense of arrival into Warrenton and guide visitors to each district. Enhance connections and modify wayfinding system throughout Warrenton. By accomplishing these goals, Warrenton can be a well connected community with a strong sense of place that connects visitors to its numerous unique, vibrant and active districts and amenities

Inclusive Landmark based Pedestrian Wayfinding via Multi-modal Directions

Navigational skills are fundamental to travelling from place to place, personal independence and community integration [2]. Current research in pedestrian wayfinding suggests that people vary significantly in their choice of navigation modalities [6, 7, 25]. In addition, pedestrians with learning disabilities find it difficult to recall routes travelled daily and stay oriented while enroute to unknown locations. This paper proposes a wayfinding interface that has 2 components: 1) temporary poly-coated cardboard signage along with imprinted information indicating a specific destination, minutes by foot, directional arrow and a QR code; 2) online interactive website to provide additional contextualized navigation instructions for pedestrians through various modalities. The University of Toronto Scarborough campus (UTSC) is being used as the physical environment to implement and test the proposed wayfinding interface. The QR code tags link the cardboard signage to the online interface and generate streaming of route instructions in the modes of panoramic video, photographs, aerial map, audio or text. The goal of the proposed wayfinding system is to aid UTSC pedestrians - especially those with learning disabilities - to orient themselves and navigate to their destination through multi-modal landmark-based, turn-by-turn directions

Inclusive and Safe Mobility Needs of Senior Citizens: Implications for Age-Friendly Cities and Communities

publishedVersio

Inclusive and Safe Mobility Needs of Senior Citizens: Implications for Age-Friendly Cities and Communities

Municipalities are concerned with addressing social issues such as mobility inclusion and safety by increasing access to transport facilities and services for all groups in society to create equitable and equal access for all citizens. Moreover, the public transportation systems provided in cities have to be inclusive and safe, driven by emerging technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based services that provide personalized recommendation to improve mobility inclusion and safety for all citizens in society, especially vulnerable road users such as senior citizens or older people. But at the moment, there are few studies that have investigated how municipalities can provide inclusive and safe public transportation in general and for senior citizens, particularly those aged 65 and above. Therefore, this study aimed to examine how to provide inclusive and safe mobility for senior citizens to improve out-of-home mobility services for senior citizens towards age-friendly cities and communities. Accordingly, a systematic literature review grounded on secondary data was adopted to investigate inclusive and safe mobility needs for senior citizens. The data were collected from previous research and existing documents, and a descriptive data analysis was carried out to provide insights on urban transportation policies related to senior citizens. Furthermore, case studies were adopted to present polices and strategies employed in Norway, Canada, the United States of America, the United Kingdom, Sweden, and Northern Ireland to identify measures employed to address the public transportation needs of an aging society, focusing on the provision of inclusive and safe mobility to senior citizens. Further findings from this study included the possible use of emerging technologies such as AI-based machine learning for inclusive and safe mobility.publishedVersio

The influence of the built environment on walking among urban, community-dwelling older adults in the United States: A systematic review and thematic synthesis

Background and Purpose: Driven by changing demographics, cultural shifts, and improvements in healthcare, the older adult population (≥65 years) in the United States (U.S.) is growing at a rapid and unprecedented rate. Simultaneously, the U.S, is becoming increasingly urbanized, with projections indicating that 87% of the U.S. population will live in urban centers by 2050. The convergence of an urbanizing and aging population necessitates a focus on aligning the urban environment with the needs of older adults. Among these needs is continued physical activity (PA) throughout older adulthood, yet despite the numerous physical, mental, and social benefits, the majority of older adults fail to meet recommended PA guidelines. Objectives: To investigate the influence of the outdoor built environment on walking behaviors among urban, community-dwelling older adults (≥65 years) in the U.S. and to analyze results with reference to implications for designing and improving communities to support active living for this population. Methods: A systematic review was conducted following PRISMA guidelines. Eight databases were searched for articles published 2011-2016 using search terms related to features of built environment, older adults, and walking. A total of 3254 abstracts were reviewed for eligibility, of which 17 studies fit all inclusion criteria. The final study set underwent quality appraisal, followed by data extraction, analysis, and thematic synthesis. Results: Findings suggest that older adults engage in PA for two primary purposes, leisure or transport, and that unique aspects of the built environment support or act as a barrier to each type of walking. Macroscale components of walkability (e.g., land use mix, street connectivity, and population density) were consistently and positively associated with transport walking, whereas microscale elements, such as aesthetics, pedestrian infrastructure, and crossing characteristics, were more commonly associated with leisure walking. Conclusions: Results support multiple associations between the built environment and walking behavior among older adults. This review furthers the current evidence regarding how macro and microscale features of the built environment can act upon older adults to support or discourage walking. While this area of research is growing, numerous gaps in the literature were identified. Future research is needed to improve the generalizability of findings to better inform future interventions and policies that support this population