#accessibility isn't something you can fucking retrofit into architecture

[valentineish]

The term "walkable cities" makes me bristle. Despite the assumption that this is ignorance borne of U.S. citizenship, I do understand the term. I share a goal with the people using it.

But the focus on walkable perpetuates the exact design principles that makes my life hell: that anybody who isn't an ablebodied, healthy adult is not a consideration. The fact that other activists are telling disabled people to sacrifice our quality of life for a narrow vision of developed spaces is what's frustrating.

#accessibility #accessible cities #architecture #walkable cities #yimby #open mic night #not to pour fuel on the fire but straight up #this is a liberal talking point #it's the same milquetoast compromise that those aligned with the center continuously demand #this happened with white feminists shouting down Black feminists 'for the bigger picture' #this happened when gays insisted trans people were 'pushing the envelope too far' #again and again liberals and centerists are CONVINCED 'a battle of inches' means equality is earned by tiers #rather than the reality that it's not equity if you're offering rights to the few rather than the whole #accessibility isn't something you can fucking retrofit into architecture #slapping ramps on shit is pointless if there's only room for a fucking 20 degree incline #you can't even reach it if you paved the whole area in that cute cobblestone!!! #where are your seats for cane users? did you make pathways wide enough for crutch users to get through without balancing on uneven ground? #did you make the inexplicable decision of slapping down a transit stop without leveling off the ground? #there's a million and one ways even *buildings* that swear up and down that they are accessible #are actually completely unusable to so many people. and it cuts you off from so much more of the world than ablebodied people know. #infrastructure