There’s nothing like asking potential users what they think of a new product. Even better if you involve them in the design process. But sometimes it’s not possible and designers resort to personas. This is often the case in digital technology. The Inclusive Design Toolkit has a suite of 12 personas representing a broad view of potential users. Each one has a story to tell about their lifestyle and their connection to technology.Many factors affect digital exclusion: prior experience, competence, motivation and general attitude about technology. The personas highlight these factors to make it easier for designers to be inclusive. Each persona has a description of their lifestyle, competency with technology, and physical and sensory capabilities. The online resource is part of the Inclusive Design Toolkit with the option to download a PDF. You can take a deeper dive into the personas as a family set. This takes personas one step further by introducing family interactions. The Inclusive Design Toolkit also has an exclusion calculatorthat estimates the number of people unable to use a product or service. The Inclusive Design Toolkit is based on thorough research over more than ten years. The personas were produced as part of a project to improve the inclusivity of railway journeys. The team wrote a conference paper about using personas for product development. They assessed the task of carrying a tray of food across a cafe, taking into account how using mobility aids restricts hand use. The title of the paper is, Evaluating inclusivity using quantitative personas. The full paper is available by request from ResearchGate.
There is much to think about when designing and fitting stairs in a home, whether a new home or a renovation. Denver architect Doug Walters has 12 tips for safer stairways in his web article, “Beautiful Hazard”. Home stairway design should be both good looking and safe. The article uses photos to illustrate points.
There is a link to some elegant solutions. I note that nothing is said about extending the handrail to the final tread in some examples.
An article on stairway design using architecture magazine pictures, researchers found the lack of handrails occurred most often. The article includes several photographs and a list of the missing safety features. Available on ReseachGate.
The Australian Human Rights Commission produced a document in 2008, “The Good, The Bad and the Ugly”, and it focuses on stairways and the placement of tactiles, handrails, and contrasting nosings – a good reference guide on what not to do.
Griffith University supported the 4th Australian Universal Design Conference held in Melbourne by publishing full papers and extended abstracts. See the links below for access.
Can homes be both eco-friendly and accessible? If not, it means people with disability and older people are excluded from the benefits of an eco-home. Part M of the UK building regulations require a level threshold and a downstairs toilet. The Lifetime Home standard provides for more flexibility for adaptation. Accessible eco homes are possible with the help of designers
A study by Amita Bhakta found the following issues with the eco home movement:
Sustainability has overridden accessibility in sustainable communities in the UK.
Disability requires greater understanding that it is more than mobility impairment.
Space beyond the home should be included in the meaning of home.
Top-down policy is not enough – co-design is required.
Planners, architects and builders in eco-housing do not consider bodily differences.
The title of the report available from Academia.edu is Accessibility in Sustainable Communities. It includes a discussion about whether sustainable communities should cater for all needs. But Bhakta points out that sustainable communities cannot regard themselves as progressive if they are exclusive. The report concludes with a model for inclusive sustainable communities. See abstract below.
There is a similar article, Making space for disability in eco-homes and eco-communities. The eco-home movement in the UK is underpinned by collaborative and communal housing and living. The aim of the movement is to minimise environmental impact and to be socially progressive.
From the abstract
We use three eco-communities in England to explore how their eco-houses and wider community spaces accommodate the complex disability of hypotonic Cerebral Palsy.
We used site visits, video footage spatial mapping, observations, survey and interviews that show little attention has be paid to making eco-houses accessible. There are four ways to interrogate accessibility in eco-communities: understanding legislation, thresholds, dexterity and mobility.
Three factors emerged: ecological living is not designed for disabled people; disabled access was only considered in relation to the house and its thresholds and not to the much broader space of the home; and eco-communities need to be spaces of diverse interaction.
The most well-known guide for ageing populations is the World Health Organization’s Age Friendly Cities and Communities. This, and similar guides, focus on “active ageing” or “positive ageing”. They aim to counter the “burden” view of older people which tends to focus on ill-health. But good health and design are closely linked. The Center for Health Design has joined the dots on universal design, health and ageing and created a checklist.
The Center for Health Design‘s checklist focuses on design features specific to older people. This checklist differs from others as it includes the health care aspect and takes a universal design approach. The checklist is not a list of comprehensive specifications, but a “thought starter”. It is best used to guide the discussion of design teams at the outset of a project. The checklist covers Home and Community including residential, Healthcare and design of clinics and emergency rooms, and Workplace designs and strategies.
The checklist matrixlists the strategy or goal, design considerations for the built environment, and the universal implications. It includes ageing in place, active living, hospital at home, hospital design, and promoting healthy lifestyles.
The checklist has a comprehensive reference list to support the content. An extract from the checklist is below.
Your Home is in its 6th edition (2022) published by the Australian Government. It has a section on the livable and adaptable house. This guide is especially helpful for home renovations and modifications as well as new builds.
The old Adaptable Housing Standard (AS4299) continues to be referenced alongside the Livable Housing Design Guidelines. The Adaptable Standard has elements similar to the Gold standard in the Livable Housing guide. However, some elements and design ideas in AS4299 are outdated or costly in this 1995 standard.
The web version is easy to navigate and covers every aspect of design including adaptation to climate change. It can also be purchased in hard copy.
There are many detailed diagrams to help explain design features and floor plans. The chapter makes distinctions between liveable and adaptable designs. Drawings and floor plans provide sufficient information for designers, renovators and homeowners alike.
From the introduction:
Many of the homes we build today will still be in use in 50 or even 100 years. Ensuring our homes are both liveable and adaptable is a key challenge for all communities.
Liveability means ensuring our homes are comfortable, healthy, efficient and connected to the community. But it also means the home is functional, safe, secure and attractive for current and future occupants.
Adaptability means that our homes can cope with changes to our households and to the climate. Making homes that are flexible, adaptable, and resilient helps us to respond to both predicted and unexpected change. It also means that we limit our environmental footprint to ensure that our communities remain sustainable.
CUDA’s Livable Housing Design Course
Get up to speed with this online course which is provided on licence from the Australian Building Codes Board and endorsed by the Building Designers Association of Australia. It covers everything from different ways to achieve a level entry, bathrooms and toilets, to doors and corridors.
Transportation systems are more than buses and bus stops, or trains and stations. They consist of infrastructure, customer service, regulations, and system organisation. Taking a universal design approach is a good way to frame and achieve inclusive mobility systems.
The chart below shows the conceptual framework for inclusive mobility. It was used as the basis for a research project.
The 7 Principles of Universal Design are translated into mobility and transportation language. Different sectors have responsibility for these components: government, private, academia, and advocacy groups. The title of the article is, Composing a Conceptual Framework for an Inclusive Mobility System. The article goes into more detail of the various components of the system. The final table identifies eight inclusive components:
Vehicle equipment
Environment
Trip management
Assistance
Operational organisation
Regulations and standards
Awareness raising
Funding
It is good to see the practical application of the Principles of Universal Design in relation to inclusive mobility. This framework brings components together nicely.
From the Abstract
This paper addresses the question how a future mobility system can be accessible to everyone regardless whether or not they have a disability. The purpose of a conceptional framework is to show how to design and organise an inclusive mobility system.
The research question is based on the seven Principles of Universal Design”, the “UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities” as well as on the UN goals on sustainable development. These theoretical principles on inclusion and inclusive design are transferred to the interdisciplinary concerns of spatial planning.
The identified accessibility and mobility requirements of individuals with disabilities are assigned to the roles and responsibilities of government, the private sector, academia and civil society and advocacy groups.
This approach identifies innovative solutions that constitute an inclusive mobility system by considering technology and non-technological driven aspects. Eight inclusive components (called i components) for the future design and organisation of an inclusive mobility system are formulated: i-Car, i-Environment, i-Ride, i-Assist, i-Organize, i-Code, i-Image and i-Funding.
Graphic design covers all kinds of creative design and visual communications. The accessibility of graphic design should always be considered in the production of websites, brochures or Word documents. Fortunately there is a great handbook for accessible graphic design to help.
Graphic design covers creative design, visual communications, applied design and technology sectors. The text covers typography, digital media, web accessibility, Office documents, accessible PDFs, print design, environmental graphic design, colour selection and more. It’s relatively easy to read and has a logical structure. At the end is a list of publications, links to websites and tools to help.
There are so many little things that graphic designers can do to make their creations more accessible. The guide shows how to make graphic creations accessible with little, if any, extra effort. The title of the guide is, AccessAbility 2: A Practical Handbook on Accessible Graphic Design,and comes from Ontario, Canada. this is a revised 2nd edition.
Beginning with some questions…
How do we plan a graphic design project to ensure it is as accessible as possible for the intended audience? What considerations do we need to make for accessibility across various media? And how does our desire to communicate effectively with people of varying abilities translate into specific design decisions?
This book is for a broad group of individuals, including professional graphic designers, clients, educators, students and many others.
At last! The national Building Ministers’ Meeting agreed to change the building code to mandate accessible features in all new homes. This represents a major social change in Australia. While evidenceshowed that Gold level of Livable Housing Design Guidelines was the most cost effective, Silver will do for now. However, there is still work to do.The building ministers were not unanimous in their decision. The Communique released after their meeting gives states and territories discretion in applying the changes. It states, “Each state and territory will be free to determine whether and how the new provisions will be applied in their jurisdiction to minimise the regulatory impact on the construction sector.”WA, NSW and SA do not support the changes. That means they will not adopt them in their state based legislation – at least, not right away. Queenslandand Victoriaare keen to get going with the new legislation. Potentially, the property industry will find it inconvenient to work with differing codes across jurisdictions and decide to conform regardless. But that will mean longer time frames before full implementation. It also means more confusion for everyone.So, from October 2022, those states that support the changes will have new homes designed to Silver level. A voluntary guide for Gold will be developed to encourage the industry to go beyond minimum. This will be a better match for the old adaptable housing standard AS4299 for those who want to go beyond minimums.
The Australian Network for Universal Housing Design (ANUHD) led the campaign for change for almost 20 years. ANUHDis a national network of committed volunteers who meet via Zoom every month. Dr Margaret Ward’s leadership and determination were instrumental to the campaign’s success. Her many letters over many years to politicians and others in power positions eventually paid off. Make no mistake, this change was not given willingly. And that is the never-ending story of all human rights campaigns. The success of the campaign is also due to the recent push by the Summer Foundation and their financial support for extra research and a campaign director. CUDA has actively supported the campaign and congratulates all involved. This issue has been a regular feature across the six years of this website. If you are interested in the history, the section of this website on Housing Design Policy has several posts. Universal Design in Housing in Australia: Getting to Yes, by Dr Ward provides an history of the campaign and the barriers advocates faced.
From 2022, all new homes will be built to Silver level of the Livable Housing Design Guidelines. That was the decision by the state and building ministers last week. But what about existing homes? How will we deal with that? The Human Rights Commission published a study by Monash University on adapting existing homes to be more accessible.The study concluded that there were two ways to increase the stock of housing that suits people with disability. One is to mandate accessible features in all new housing. That part is almost a done deal. The second way is “through some form of modification or adaptation, which may involve a substantial renovation”.The focus of the report is on the second point – adaptation of existing stock. Renovations for home offices and multigenerational living are current examples of adaptation. The researchers wanted to see if there ways to design for flexibility and adaptation. The overall aim is to see if there is a way of improving current stock for the benefit of everyone.
Monash University carried out the scoping study titled, Adaptable housing for people with disability in Australia: A scoping study. It has three parts. The first two cover current approaches to home modifications. The third part looks at the overall housing landscape for people with disability. The authors note that designers and architects are rarely involved in discussions on how best to adapt a home. Rather, it usually requires an occupational therapist to make recommendations. Quality of life and aesthetics are rarely factored into these assessments because of funding constraints.
There’s nothing like asking potential users what they think of a new product. Even better if you involve them in the design process. But sometimes it’s not possible and designers resort to personas. This is often the case in digital technology. The Inclusive Design Toolkit has a suite of 12 personas representing a broad view of potential users. Each one has a story to tell about their lifestyle and their connection to technology.
Many factors affect digital exclusion: prior experience, competence, motivation and general attitude about technology. The personas highlight these factors to make it easier for designers to be inclusive. Each persona has a description of their lifestyle, competency with technology, and physical and sensory capabilities.
The online resource is part of the Inclusive Design Toolkit with the option to download a PDF. You can take a deeper dive into the personas as a family set. This takes personas one step further by introducing family interactions. The Inclusive Design Toolkit also has an exclusion calculator that estimates the number of people unable to use a product or service.
The Inclusive Design Toolkit is based on thorough research over more than ten years. The personas were produced as part of a project to improve the inclusivity of railway journeys.
The team wrote a conference paper about using personas for product development. They assessed the task of carrying a tray of food across a cafe, taking into account how using mobility aids restricts hand use. The title of the paper is, Evaluating inclusivity using quantitative personas. The full paper is available by request from ResearchGate.
There is much to think about when designing and fitting stairs in a home, whether a new home or a renovation. Denver architect Doug Walters has 
Can homes be both eco-friendly and accessible? If not, it means people with disability and older people are excluded from the benefits of an eco-home. Part M of the UK building regulations require a level threshold and a downstairs toilet. The Lifetime Home standard provides for more flexibility for adaptation. Accessible eco homes are possible with the help of designers 
The most well-known guide for ageing populations is the World Health Organization’s 
Get up to speed with this
Transportation systems are more than buses and bus stops, or trains and stations. They consist of infrastructure, customer service, regulations, and system organisation. Taking a universal design approach is a good way to frame and achieve inclusive mobility systems.
The international Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disability asked Australia some 
From 2022, all new homes will be built to Silver level of the