Disability and accessibility websites links

Here's some websites and blogs which cover disability and accessibility issues. As always, the usual disclaimers apply! — (we're not responsible for the content of other websites)

• TechDis
  leading educational advisory service, working across the UK, in the fields of accessibility and inclusion.
• Royal National Institute for the Blind: web access centre blog.
• BBC | Access 2.0
  This is a BBC blog all about their work on accessibility.
  
• Ouch! is the website for the BBC Radio Show. It has a long blogroll of blogs by disabled people.
  
• Accessify Forum
  This is one of the few online forums devoted to accessibility. Very geeky!
• Disapedia
  To provide all the community, information and resources any disabled individual could want or need.
  
• WebAIM (Web Accessibility in Mind) is committed to improving the Web for disabled people.
  One service the site offers is a screen reader simulation which will give you an idea of how a blind person might use the Web. Other services include a distractibility simulation, which shows how a person with a cognitive disability might see the Web, and a low vision simulation.
  
• The Gimp Parade
  Feminist disability politics and cultural analysis.
• But You Don't Look Sick?
  Magazine about living life to the fullest with any disability, invisible disease, or chronic pain.
• Disability Studies, Temple U.
  Cool stuff in the world of Geography, Disability Studies, and Educational Leadership. Based at Temple University in Philadelphia, with contributors from coast to coast. Check out our 'Notable Blogs' list - your portal to the disability blog world.
  
• The 4th Avenue Blues
  I am a 34 year old man living with and experiencing paranoid schizophrenia. Here I write about my daily travels through life and living with a mental illness.
• Disability Rants
  Step in and read some of my trials and tribulations of life as a wheelchair user.
  
  
  

The local punt firm with a heart of gold

If your idea of punting in Cambridge is crowds of assorted students, tourists and local people weaving around and falling in the river, you may think it's not for you, but think again ……

Down a beautiful backwater you will find a family firm renowned for their friendly, helpful attitude, especially to people who are a little anxious about getting in and out of a punt.

Lawrence Austen and his team were nominated in 2005 and again in 2006 because of their outstanding care for wheelchair users, people with learning disabilities and the elderly.

Nominations have come from a German studying at long Road Sixth Form College, a Canadian holidaymaker and a club visiting Cambridge for the day.

Many residents always recommend the Granta because they know it is an independent firm which can be relied on to look after their customers and give them a day to remember.

http://www.puntingincambridge.com

A week in Somerset

I've just come back from a week in Somerset and did the usual bus driver's holiday of checking the local access facilities and comparing them to those visitors to Cambridge would encounter.


I stayed in a farm cottage, which though not perfectly accessible has won some government access awards. See http://www.doublegatefarm.com/



We stayed in near Wells and in sight of Glastonbury Tor. Last year they were filming Hot Fuzz in the City and so we dutifully watch the said DVD while in the locale. Wells Cathedral and Bishop's Palace do their best to give access to their medieval constructions. Though the Wells and Mendip Museum has very little access to their collections.

http://www.wellscathedral.org.uk/



I visited a couple of regional attractions. The SS Great Britain, which is one of the first steam ships, rather than a British wing of Hitler's regime and was designed by Brunel. Brunel was an incredible engineer turning his mind to trains, ships, railways and bridges, one man doing what 4 seperate companies would do now. I wondered what access inventions he could have been nominated for for the Way To Be Awards if he were our contemporary. The ship is in dry dock, though a lift can take all to an underwater experience to see the hull of the ship. Both the museum and ship have good disabled access and the SS Britain is well worth a visit.

http://www.ssgreatbritain.org

The New Orleans Bedroom at the American Museum

Another visit was to the American Museum near Bath. I didn't know what the museum would hold and it is housed in a stately home. The collection was of American antiquites, including those of the first peoples and of all periods since the arrival of the Europeans. Within the house are actually rooms from Wild West taverns, settlers farmsteads and southern plantation houses.

http://www.americanmuseum.org/


Mark J Taylor

Swimming for All

Swimming for All at Chesterton Sports Centre

Another 2006 nomination was for the management team at Chesterton Sports Centre, who went to great trouble to make it possible for local blind and partially sighted residents to enjoy the benefits of going swimming.

The photo shows the swimmers who go along on Tuesday afternoons at 2.opm. As well as the usual lifeguard, regular volunteers are on hand to provide any help required by partially-sighted swimmers. Don't worry, someone will look after your guide dog!

http://www.cambridge.gov.uk/ccm/content/sports/citysport-brochure/chesterton-sports-centre.en

Welcome to The Way To Be Awards blog

I am Mark Taylor and I am the Access Officer at Cambridge City Council. I work in the Planning Department, because an important part of my time is spent in looking at planning applications for new developments, and advising people on how best to make changes to old buildings.

Although helpfulness and consideration are as old as mankind, some changes needed legislation, and that's what the Disability Discrimination Act (the DDA) did in 2004. Now all services, businesses and public buildings have to consider how everyone, including people with disabilities, get in, join in and find their way around.

Businesses nominated for The Way To Be awards in 2006 included a lot of shops and taxi drivers, which is not surprising when you consider how important it is to be able to get where you want to go, and to buy the things you need. Everyday things that many people take for granted, but the people who nominated our 2006 heroes didn't take them for granted and we will be featuring them on this blog over the coming weeks.