Global Resources and Promising Practices for Building and Refining Accessible and Inclusive Smart Cities from Darren Bates LLC.
Traveling to work, meeting friends for a catch up or just doing some shopping are often taken for granted by people with no known disabilities. For the visually impaired, these seemingly simple things can be a serious challenge. But imagine a city equipped with technology that enables the visually impaired to recognise people, places or even bank notes, helping them…
Read More
Citizen participation throughout the urban planning process can lead to the development of spaces and buildings that enable cities to develop urban environments that truly reflect people’s needs and preferences.
Read More
Accessibility to some key information and communication technologies (ICTs) like TV, websites, books, assisted medical devices, mobile phones and apps for persons with disabilities (PWDs) remain a mere lip service, according to users and experts in the field. India is ranked 46th in the world and 9th amongst lower-middle-income countries behind Egypt, Kenya, Angola, and the Philippines according to the…
Read More
India’s hill cities are unique poles of development. While they have managed to record some degree of economic growth, increasing urban population and unfavourable topography have also made such growth haphazard and unsustainable. In turn, this has threatened the quality of the built environment and of urban life in these cities. This report studies the case of the hill city…
Read More
Smart technologies, such as robotic telepresence and the Internet of Things (IoT), are capturing the attention of adaptive technology programs in state and local governments, as well as educational institutions, according to experts. IoT and robotic telepresence are among the latest adaptive technology (AT) efforts states are deploying, as they seek to deliver on the 30-year-old Technology-Related Assistance Act of…
Read More
Even just walking on Via del Corso in Rome or on Esplanadi in Helsinki it is possible to notice how much people live their city through the smartphones, but we rarely focus on how the use of the new technologies is contributing to promote inclusion and participation to the life of the urban contexts. The metropolitan areas of Helsinki and…
Read More
The answer seems to be a hopeful yes. At least 100 buildings each in 50 cities will be made accessible in a couple of years. These are part of the much hyped, technology intensive and ambitious ‘Smart Cities’ in the country. The Government had decided to turn 100 cities Smart.
The Government has selected these 50 cities under the Accessible India Campaign. Accordingly, the focus will be on auditing and ensuring access to atleast 25-50 of the most important government buildings in these cities fully accessible to these people by the end of 2017. By end of 2018, the target is to cover 50 per cent of all government building of the national capital region and all state capitals within reach….
Read More
On November 1, 2017, the DIAUD Network held another successful meeting in preparation for the 9th World Urban Forum (WUF9), which will take place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia next February. Members provided information about their planned representation and contributions at the Forum and were also able to collaborate in planning logistics for various events and meetings that will be taking place. The discussion was led by Federico Batista Poitier, Executive Assistant to the President and Communications Coordinator for Global Alliance on Accessible Technologies and Environments (GAATES) outlining the side events under consideration by GAATES and World Enabled for WUF9….
Read More