Speaking of accessibility…
Web-standards minded developers often discuss (and occasionally argue about) web accessibility. Making the web accessible involves making websites flexible enough to provide adequate information to assistive devices such as screen readers used by the blind. This involves using descriptive text in links, writing semantic markup to denote meaning and function, and providing "alt" attributes for contextual images among many other things.
Many opponents of web accessibility practices (and legislation) argue that the techniques required to make websites accessible are not practical. They insist that the return on investment for considering disabled users is not valuable enough to justify the extra work. They insist that government agencies and/or businesses should not have to implement these techniques if their intention is to exclude disabled users from their audience. (Ethics aside here; morals and capitalism split a long time ago.)
The opponents of web accessibility usually cite offline examples to defend their position. Examples:
ATMs don't have braille.Whoops… nevermind that.- Products on sale at your local store don't have braille.
- (Insert irrelevant inanimate objects here) don't have braille.
There is no substance in these claims because the web is a unique medium where accessible development is far easier than it would be at your local store or bank. It is, however, nice to find a counter example:
I see these models often when traveling around the great state of Hesse, Germany. This one was at the main area in Marburg. All touristy landmarks have these models nearby, which include a text description of the landmark, a braille version of that description, and a scale model. They have these not only for sighted tourists, but more importantly so that blind tourists can learn about the landmark and "see" the landmark by feeling the model with their hands. In this way, blind people can enjoy the landmarks throughout Hesse too.
Did the Tourism Department of Hesse calculate the return on investment of building these models? Was there a practical business case for making them? Or was this purely an ethical choice? Regardless of the reason, I would appraise these models at a few hundred euros minimum; far more expensive than coding a few alt attributes into a website (which cost nothing). Here's looking at you, Target. Here's looking at Target twice.
Do you have other examples of accessible design offline? Share them here.
Note: the above photo is hosted on Zooomr. You can click it to get multiple sizes and see more information about it. If you would like to use the image on your own site, you must provide attribution to me.
wait wait wait
"ATMs don’t have braille."
forserious? All the ones around here (Windsor/Detroit) do - I just always assumed all of them do, too. Guess not.
I was always confused at the drive-through ATMs having them. Think about it.
I'm not sure if this counts entirely but in all my time spent on trains (and that's a lot of time!) and buses not once have I ever seen somebody with a wheelchair get on either. Yet they are all designed so that wheelchair users can get on.
We have some new road crossings in Edinburgh that instead of beeping to tell people to cross they have somebody speaking out and telling us which road to cross (2 lanes). This is only useful for blind people.
I think accessibility on the web is about more than allowing disabled people use the web it's about making sure anybody can use the web. In that respect it isn't so different from designing a keyboard that has legs, or a bike that has a seat you can move up or down. Is accessible design all around us?
Thank you, thank you. I have become very frustrated with these apples-and-oranges 'if Company X is expected to make its Web site accessible, should it also be expected to produce two versions of its printed catalogue, one of them in Braille?' arguments. They miss the essential point that the Web isn't a physical object; it's electronic data, that can be output in a variety of differently-accessible media provided that the coding quality allows this.
UK banknotes are a good example of accessible design off the Web. They're graded in size according to their value, so as to enable blind people to tell them apart, and the design of each also incorporates a distinctive shape of flat colour to aid recognition by people with low vision.
Phil: I don't know why I said that ATM's don't have braille, they most certainly all do. Whoops.
Dave: I've definitely seen people in wheelchairs get on busses and trains.
Gemma: Euros are sized by value too. I'm reminded of the movie "Daredevil." If you remember, Daredevil is blind and at the beginning of the movie you see him filling his wallet with cash for the day. He has each denomination of money in different rolls because if they were mixed he would not be able to tell them apart. I would venture to say that Daredevil should just forget about working in America and go to Europe, where the banknotes are made just for him.
Those scale models are completely awesome — I've never seen such a thing before. One feature that comes to mind are the audible crosswalk signs they're putting up all round me. Not only do they light up when it's safe to cross — they emit a distinct beeping sound to alert those who are visually impaired. I'll have to take an extra second to try and notice some more accessibility features in real life.