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I've been seeing discourse again about the real/supposed ableism of transit and walkability advocacy, and I am once again frustrated by the incredible car-centricity of it.
I am disabled in ways that can limit access to walking-oriented spaces, but I've also never been a driver. When people talk about the difficulties of managing an invisible disability on public transit, I nod my head hard -- but so often this turns into a subtext/text of "we still need to privilege cars."
That... loses me.
I'm not even a ban-cars type; I accept that they are going to be the best solution in a small minority of use cases. But when I hear someone arguing -- or seeming to argue -- that making car use *possible but inconvenient* is ableist, honestly what I hear is good old American car dependence filtered through an intersectional lens.
When I see videos of disabled folks in motor wheelchairs / scooters / etc rocketing down bike paths in Europe, that looks like freedom to me.
I don't use those kinds of mobility aids because, in the American social & built environment, there's not really any such thing as only using one when you need to. So on my bad days, I stay home or get driven everywhere; both of which I hate.
But that is changeable. And it is frankly MOST changeable if we stop obsessing over cars.
@betsythemuffin I want more thought into the architecture of how to support mobility limitations in transit discussions. We could be doing more now to make sure there are benches to wait for subways and busses on and that the routes are frequent and ubiquitous to be useful.
I know I see discussions about how easy it would be to have car free roads and basically assume the vision is one that means I won’t be able to use it because most public spaces don’t provide areas where I can rest today.
@Vero I hear that. I live in SF, where bus shelters are practically nonexistent... and SFDOT seems committed to making the shelters we do have worse at great public expense.
What I would like to see, personally, is more overall respite areas in public spaces -- more parklets, more benches, etc -- both at transit stops AND in other places.
I think one sign for hope is that SF's car free roads have tended to organically develop those respite spaces. Wondering, now, why that is.
@Vero I think it's probably the way that SF Slow Streets have been caretaken by local urbanism advocates as reclaiming public space from cars; and by local businesses as free space to expand into.
Both groups are motivated to make reclaimed streets into pleasant areas where people want to congregate and linger, albeit for different reasons...
and even abled people are more likely to congregate and linger when they can sit down!