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María Jesús Ruiz, vicepresidenta primera y consejera de Medio Ambiente de Castilla y León y el consejero de Familia e Igualdad de Oportunidades, César Antón, han presentado en el Monumento Natural La Fuentona (Soria) el Programa 'Castilla y León, accesible por naturaleza' en un acto que contó con la presencia del responsable de Instituciones de Castilla y León de la Caixa, Gerardo Revilla; el alcalde de Muriel de la Fuente, Alfredo Lafuente, así como representantes de la junta rectora del espacio natural.

A Turismo Adaptado está lançando um novo portal para passar informações a respeito de acessibilidade e inclusão, especialmente no lazer e turismo. 

A idéia é globalizar, e ter informações de todas as partes do mundo, e nos mais diversos campos relacionados à pessoa com deficiência e o lazer e turismo. Quem quiser pode registrar seu email e receber informações automaticamente, que serão publicadas com regularidade. 

Todos podem participar enviando qualquer tipo de colaboração, isso será bastante importante. Ajudem espalhar essa ferramenta, e assim estará ajudando toda a sociedade a compreender essas questões, além de manter informado todas as pessoas que já fazem parte.

 

Yaad Nagish Ltd. develops tactile signs and design solutions.

A Showcase Deep Green Demonstration Project

The Green Access Home at Suncadia, a Sustainable Preserve in the Pines is a showcase Built Green demonstration project is a 2,000 square foot family contemporary mountain cabin taking full advantage of the abundant sunshine and views. This home features full universal accessibility and is designed to be enjoyed by friends and family, with entertaining centered on cooking, visiting, and outdoor activities. The house is in-touch with nature, blurring the lines between indoors and outdoors; and emphasizes affordable and cost-effective sustainability that has been seamlessly integrated into the design.

Some of the Key Green Attributes:

• Deep green integrated with universal design
• Focus on affordability
• Small one-story home utilizing local, salvaged, durable and non-toxic materials, passive solar plus green energy systems and technologies
• Limited site disturbance, pervious pavers and native landscaping
• Ultra-low VOC levels including environmentally friendly paints, caulking and sealants for all indoor components of the home
• Energy efficient insulation, windows and heating system
• Energy Star appliances

...every design process should be collaborative, involving all the interested parties at every stage. The designer is the orchestra conductor who knows how to face up to the fascinating challenge of factoring all those apparently conflicting interests into a win-win situation. Design is not a profession for people who apply rulebooks and restrictive standards, but for people who think outside the box, applying their intellectual curiosity to take things further than their clients know how to expect.

Design for All starts from this precept to aply design thinking to facing the real challenges in today's multiethnic, multicultural, multiability and multi-everything society. Working to achieve and maintain social inclusion (note, that does not mean social integration if it is not wanted), our latest challenge is to maintain this agenda in the face of knee-jerk backtracking when economic times get hard.

Design for All starts from this precept to aply design thinking to facing the real challenges in today's multiethnic, multicultural, multiability and multi-everything society. Working to achieve and maintain social inclusion (note, that does not mean social integration if it is not wanted), our latest challenge is to maintain this agenda in the face of knee-jerk backtracking when economic times get hard.

All designers know that the world needs a lot of designing (consider the appalling mess it's in now), yet many lament a shortage of work. Why this oxymoron? Because so large a part of the design community tends to contemplate its navel, celebrate its brilliance and expect the world to take notice... without ever being told about what design can do for it. EIDD believes in taking the message about Design for All and its potential out into the world at large, informing, lobbying, organising conferences.

If any of this strikes a chord with you, or if you want to discuss it and push the agenda further in your part of the world, you are very welcome to join us.

From Abilities Canada:

Visitors to the home of Frank and Sharon Palermo are struck by the beauty of the house -

open-concept design, hardwood floors, granite countertops and maple cabinetry in the kitchen, a deck off the dining room and another off the kitchen. The entryway is flooded with light from windows lining the four-storey stairwell that circles behind a central elevator. How decadent - an elevator!

It is only after Sharon comes to greet you in her wheelchair that you realize it is also an accessible house with some of the best features of Universal Design.

Carta de Naziberto Lopes:

Prezados, compartilho com voces um pouco de minhas bandeiras de luta frente a Secretaria de EStado dos Direitos das Pessoas com Deficiencia.

Acho que alguns conhecem a Vereadora Mara Gabrilli, pessoa com tetraplegia que foi eleita com o maior número de votos para a cadeira que ocupa na Camara .

Foi também a primeira titular da Secretaria Municipal da Pessoa com Deficiencia e Mobilidade Reduzida, criada pelo então Prefeito José Serra.

A Mara é apresentadora de um programa chamado derrubando barreiras, acesso para todos, que é veiculado todas as segundas-feiras na Radio Eldorado AM. Neste programa ela entrevista pessoas que tem algum tipo de trabalho ou luta por melhor condição de inclusão e acessibilidade para todos e desta vez eu tive o privilégio de ser o seu convidado.

Em uma entrevista bastante extrovertida ela me questionou sobre meu percurso de vida, após o advento da deficiencia visual e naquilo em que acredito, defendo e sobre o qual estou debruçado ultimamente.

Quem quiser me dar a honra de ouvir um pouco dessa história, se bem que muitíssimo resumida, fiquem a vontade para entrar no link:

www.derrubandobarreirasacessoparatodos.blogspot.com/

Desde Em Dia Com a Cidadaina:

Wander é diretor do Grupo Adapt e está à frente da loja Rea Team/ Adapt, recém-inaugurada na Tijuca. O espaço é o primeiro do Rio de Janeiro a oferecer num mesmo local a venda de cadeiras de rodas e objetos adaptados sob medida, serviços de isenção de impostos na compra de carros especiais e adaptação veicular.

Também serão comercializados produtos como rampas, elevadores e plataformas elevatórias, para tornar empresas, estabelecimentos públicos e comerciais acessíveis a todos. Novidade que deve ser lançada em breve, a autoescola especializada na formação de condutores deficientes físicos será a primeira com essas características no Rio. Os instrutores já estão sendo treinados para atender esse público especial e o espaço físico também já está preparado.

A loja funcionará de segunda a sexta, das 8h às 18h, e aos sábados, das 9h às 14h. O endereço é Rua Haddock Lobo, 203 A, Tijuca. Mais informações pelos telefones 3273-1567 e 3296-1888.

On Wheelmap.org you can find accessible locations. Everybody can add a place and mark it as accessible, partly accessible or not accessible. We also collect information from other databases and add it to the map.

Wheelmap is an open project under an open license. That means you can use the data as long as you link back to http://wheelmap.org. We cooperate with openstreetmap.

The people behind Wheelmap.org are the SOZIALHELDEN.

If you'd like to share location data or are interested in working with us, please call or e-mail Raul Krauthausen:

phone: +49 170 770 23 88
e-mail: click here.

Image via Wikipedia

People come up to Aimee Mullins all the time and say, "you know, I have to tell you, you just don't look disabled." The record-setting athlete, actress and model says, "And it's sweet because I know that they're confused, and they're telling me this because they know I'm missing both legs from the shin down, but they're presented with this package of a highly capable young woman. This has happened all over the world."

And so it is.

... and his modified Frontier X5 all-terrain power chair through five countries over a two-month period, from November 2007 to January 2008. Along the way, we see all of his adventures, both joyful and hair-raising. He encounters shady characters while searching for lodging after midnight in New Zealand, visits the Taj Mahal, sails up the Mekong River, and nearly loses his wheelchair while trekking through Cambodia.

Why did he embark on this trip in the first place? Simply put, he was bored.

It took a lot of planning for Drew Shelley to be able to have this conversation in India. For one thing, he adapted his chair to be easily broken down into parts that fit through narrow Indian train doors.

"I wanted more out of life than I was getting," says Shelley, 27, who has Emery-Dreifuss muscular dystrophy.

Monica Wharton, Host of Disability News & Views Radio Show, interviewed Betsy Beaumon of Bookshare.

You can listen to the interview at the link below. (Preview: Watch for a "backstory" tomorrow):

Betsy Beaumon, Vice President, Bookshare is the world's largest online accessible library for individuals with print disabilities, such as blindness, low vision, a physical or reading disability that makes it difficult for them to read standard print.

Bookshare is free to qualified U.S. schools and students through a $32 million award from the U.S. Department of Education, Office of Special Education Programs (OSEP). The library has tens of thousands of books including best sellers, textbooks, teacher-recommended reading and periodicals along with two software applications that read digital books.

Listen to the interview to find out more how individuals, parents and educators can sign up. "Providing books without barriers"

Mara Gabrilli lança cartilha online da avenida, que hoje é a mais acessível da América Latina

It was just brought to my attention that I never actually published a post about the wonderful work of Shaka Surf Camp in Costa Rica: