Increasing Access to Transit: Localized Mobile Information

While several studies note the challenges that people with disabilities face when using public transit, little work has investigated how mobile transit information apps affect accessibility. To address this gap, we recruited transit riders who are blind, who have low vision, who use mobility devices, and who have no disabilities. We asked them to use a transit information app, Tiramisu, for 21 days during their regular travel. We observed participants struggling with a number of barriers that had previously been reported. However, the localized transit information also removed barriers to travel; we observed participants engaging in less preplanning and more opportunistic travel. We also identified new opportunities to improve transit use through mobile information.     

Homeless young people ‘strategizing’ a route to housing stability: service fatigue,exiting attempts and living ‘off grid’

Abstract

While access to housing has been identified as a crucial enabler to young people exiting homelessness, relatively little is known about the experiences of youth who encounter barriers in their attempts to secure housing. Mobilizing a pathways approach, this paper examines homeless young people’s experiences of seeking housing in a context of housing market forces that blocked their efforts to carve a route out of homelessness. The research, which is biographical and longitudinal, was conducted in Ireland between 2013 and 2016 and involved the collection of data at two points in time. At baseline, 40 young people aged 16–24 years and 10 of their family members were recruited (Phase 1) and, at the point of follow-up two years later (Phase 2), 74% of participants were retained in the study. By Phase 2, just 24% of the study’s young people were housed, pointing to significant barriers of access to housing. Moving beyond the identification of the impact of housing market forces on young people’s ability to exit homelessness, the analysis examines young people’s responses, focussing on the strategies used by them as they attempted to reclaim autonomy and control over their housing futures. Implications for the development of sustainable housing solutions that specifically cater to the needs of homeless youth are discussed.     

Explorations in specifying construction price forecast loss functions

Currently, skills shortages are prompting the UK government to introduce initiatives intended to break down notions of stereotyped employment and attract women to non-traditional, male-dominated industries such as construction. Thus, it seems timely to revisit a study of the lived experience of non-traditionally employed women, conducted in Northern Ireland in the mid-1990s. Data from this study are presented here, specifically contextualized within R. M. Kanter's (American Journal of Sociology, 82, 965-90) framework of tokenism. Utilizing this framework, the paper examines the relationship that exists between the sexes (women as ‘tokens’ and males as ‘dominants’) in the non-traditional settings examined, indicating that barriers remain that women must surmount for gender equality to be achieved. The paper concludes by briefly examining one initiative working pro-actively to remove these barriers, providing women with greater opportunities to pursue non-traditional careers.     

Women in the UK construction industry

This paper considers the opportunities for, and barriers against, women within the UK construction industry. Women form the greater proportion of the economically active UK population and yet within construction, and other industries, they are under represented. Data available clearly indicates that women are more than capable of performing the tasks undertaken by many professional male counter-parts. Many of the professional bodies within the industry have a women's cohort, which may be perceived as a useful starting point, but does not fully reflect the potential available. It is suggested that women should be better represented and consideration is given to methods suitable for increasing the representation and reducing or eliminating some of the barriers to entry and eventual retention.     

Housing the Aged in New South Wales: Planning Policy for Group Housing

In 1982, the New South Wales Government introduced State Environmental Planning Policy (SEPP) No. 5, ‘Housing for Aged or Disabled Persons’. This Policy is a statutory planning instrument under the Environmental Planning and Assessment Act, 1979. It allows housing for people over fifty-five and for disabled people to be built anywhere where a dwelling-house may be built as long as the site is within or adjacent to an urban area. It allows it even where local planning controls prohibit it.     

构建无障碍交通体系,建设和谐城市

减少或消除城市道路的障碍,以方便城市道路中的人群.重点考虑残疾、老、幼、弱、病等弱势人群的使用.无障碍交通体系是为广大障碍人群提供行动方便和安全空间,创造一个"平等、参与"的环境,同时惠及所有人群的体系,体现了我国"以人为本,创建和谐社会"的政策.     

Housing Pathways of Disabled Young People: Evidence for Policy and Practice

Most studies of disabled young people's housing experiences focus on structural constraints, with little attention given to the role of young people themselves in shaping their housing biographies. Using Clapham's (2002) housing pathways framework, this paper reflects on new empirical data to examine interactions between structure, agency and wider discourses in the housing pathways of disabled young people. The paper develops a typology of disabled young people's housing pathways, consisting of direct, staged and return pathways to independent living. Within each of these pathways, young people face key challenges of deciding to leave, finding suitable accommodation and maintaining their accommodation. The research identifies some of the complex interconnected factors that shape the ways young people negotiate these challenges and in doing so key messages emerge for policy makers and practitioners. Moreover, the paper not only informs policy and practice but also responds to questions that have recently been asked of the pathways framework and social constructionism more generally.     

Towards inclusion: rethinking architectural education

In 2009, concerned at the low profile of disabled architects, the Royal Institute of British Architects commissioned the University of the West of England, Bristol to undertake research into the experiences of disabled people both as students and as practitioners of architecture. The aim of the research was to assess the current situation and identify and distil best practice in encouraging and enabling disabled people to pursue an architectural career. The research method included online questionnaires and interviews with disabled people who were either studying or practising as architects. Support workers, with a variety of roles and remits in both education and practice, were interviewed to assess the level and quality of provision and to determine attitudes towards disabled people. Websites of schools of architecture and practices were analysed. Significant issues were revealed relating to the representation and participation of disabled people in architectural education and employment. In particular, the educational ethos, curriculum and delivery raised concerns, as education acts as a gatekeeper to the profession. It is concluded that architecture schools and practitioners need to be proactive in creating more inclusive cultures and approaches to design which in turn could benefit the design of the built environment.     

Evolution of federal and state policies for persons with disability in the United States: Efficiency and welfare impacts

This paper focuses on the labor force participation and earnings of the working age disabled in the United States, as they vary by gender, age, and minority status. Expenditure on public and private sector programs targeted to persons with disabilities exceed $100 billion for approximately 8m individuals. Program objectives are to increase employment opportunities among the disabled as well as, provide public assistance through various welfare provisions. This paper argues public policies and public expenditures have favored assistance and short run equity concerns relative to rehabilitation and vocational training, thus providing work disincentives to people with disabilities and undermining their long-term welfare.     

浅谈残疾人康复中心规划与建筑设计-以西宁市残疾人康复服务中心设计为例

文章以西宁残疾人康复服务中心设计为例，指出在残疾人康复服务中心设计中．仍需以“人”为核心，突出康复特性，坚持以满足使用者需要和需求为主，并以支持使用活动并突出无障碍设计为重心。     

Access and the project manager

The role of the project manager has traditionally concentrated upon the execution of a project, from conception to completion. The commissioning and operation have been a secondary priority, for good reasons which are discussed in this paper. Nowhere has this been more true than in building construction, despite the fact that a building is a place where there is maximum interaction with people of all types. Some 10% of people worldwide are disabled, which prevents them from using buildings and facilities designed for able-bodied people. All this is changing rapidly. No longer should buildings be designed to be accessible only to the majority, nor should special arrangements be provided as an ‘extra’ for disabled people. Design philosophy is being impelled to provide for all building users. Great impetus was provided by the 1981 International Year of Disabled Persons, designated by the United Nations. In the UK, The Prince of Wales' Advisory Group on Disability and the Access Committee for England are influential and active organizations that are exerting a powerful influence for change. New building regulations are introducing a statutory imperative. The attention of project managers is drawn to what is happening in this area, and it is suggested that in their unique position they can influence the bridging of the gap between designers and building operators, to ensure that buildings can be used by all, and that nothing is overlooked at any stage. Legislation alone cannot solve the problem, and a change in attitude is necessary.     

En-gendering Effective Planning: Spatial Mismatch,Low-Income Women,and Transportation Policy

Welfare-to-work transportation programs are predicated on a conceptualization of the spatial mismatch hypothesis that focuses on the central-city residential locations of welfare participants, rapidly expanding job opportunities in the suburbs, and the long commutes needed to connect them. Feminist scholarship and travel behavior research, however, show that the travel patterns of low-income single mothers are not consistent with this behavior, resulting in a policy mismatch between many welfare recipients and their transportation needs. The research reviewed in this article indicates that policymakers and planners should do more to address the transportation needs of these low-income women. Policies must account for the important role of gender in determining where welfare recipients will look for work, how they are likely to conduct their job searches, and the mode by which they travel to both employment and household-supporting destinations.     

OFF TO MARKET: NEIGHBORHOOD AND INDIVIDUAL EMPLOYMENT BARRIERS FOR WOMEN IN 21ST CENTURY AMERICAN CITIES*

ABSTRACT: This paper endeavors to create a better understanding of the barriers to employment faced by disadvantaged urban women in the post–welfare reform era. Using data from the Project on Devolution and Urban Change, a unique geographically linked, longitudinal, multicity set of survey data, logistic regression models weighs the relative importance of individual barriers to employment (e.g., poor health, childcare, family responsibilities) and contextual or neighborhood barriers to employment (e.g., poverty rate, joblessness rate) on labor market outcomes. Results reveal that several neighborhood characteristics are predictive of employment outcomes, including automobile access, female‐headedness, vacancy, and disorder. Results suggest a more complex, nuanced interplay between neighborhood‐level variables and individually measured variables in preventing some women from obtaining both modestly paying employment with few allocated hours of work per week, and also better‐paying jobs with more hours of work per week.     

Sources of regional variation in youth employment

This paper uses state data for the late 1970's in a regression model to assess the relative importance of several hypotheses that have been advanced to explain the significant relative deterioration in youth employment opportunities. The paper also attempts to evaluate the nature and importance of regional differences with respect to the variables that are associated with youth employment opportunities. In particular the paper focuses on the effects of minimum wages and efforts to alter wages by unions, the expanded youth population and the changing labor force participation of females, differences in labor market tightness, expenditures on job training, schooling decisions on the part of young people and the general influence of poverty. Drawing on the empirical evidence, the authors conclude that a policy of regional minimum wages might result in a ten to twenty percent expansion in youth employment and achieving full employment for adult males might have an approximately equal effect.     

An input–output analysis of Thailand's construction sector

Three input–output (IO) tables compiled between 1995 and 2000 were used to examine the significance of the construction sector and its relationships with other sectors of the Thai economy. The pull and push effect of the Thai construction sector to the national economy indicated that the former is much larger than the latter. Additionally, the relatively high output multipliers and backward linkage indicators showed that the construction sector had the potential to trigger off production in many economic sectors linked to it. An aggregated sectoral analysis revealed the high dependence of construction on manufacturing followed by services. The findings also suggest that the trends of the profile of inputs and outputs are correlated to the economic conditions in Thailand at the time the IO tables were compiled. Finally, the results of employment analysis showed that although the share of construction sector in direct employment generation may not be very large, its economic importance lies in its direct and indirect contribution to employment through strong backward linkage effects. Consequently, when its backward linkages and output multiplier are considered together with the employment opportunities latent within it, then the construction sector could be a major contributor to the economic growth of Thailand.     

The promotion of access legislation—A developing country perspective from Ghana

In Ghana, as in other developing African countries, there is growing awareness of the reality that some of the key constraints towards the participation of disabled persons in development programmes, are the physical barriers in the built environment, which inhibit the free movement of disabled persons to places of education, employment, commerce, recreation and worship. This paper discusses some of the local factors that have restrained the promotion of access legislation in Ghana, and recommends strategic actions for utilising existing institutional structures to pursue access legislation to safeguard the accessibility of the built environment to disabled persons.     

上海轨道交通无障碍环境建设的再思考

城市无障碍交通体系的建设已经成为现代城市一种发展趋势。改善行动不方便者的交通出行是城市的一项重要责任,同时又可以提高城市运行的效率。已经进入老年社会的上海,因老致残的比例日益提高。交通出行是人们的一项基本权利,我们必须及早采取有效应对措施,建设一个更加宜居的城市。上海轨道交通无障碍环境建设起步早,已成为残疾人出行的重要交通工具,但也还存在一些不便之处。首先阐述了上海轨道交通无障碍环境建设的背景,分析存在的问题,指出在轨道交通无障碍环境建设中理念转变的重要性。通过对国际无障碍建设先进理念的分析,结合上海的实际情况,提出上海轨道交通无障碍建设的建议。     

The Uneven Distribution of Employment Opportunities: Neighborhood and Race in Cleveland,Ohio

The passage of new welfare legislation has intensified questions regarding the relative availability of job opportunities. While unemployment rates nationwide are low, some scholars argue that job opportunities are not evenly distributed between neighborhoods and that whatever opportunities exist do not match the skills of the nearby labor pool. This article examines the number of jobs available to people within very small-scale labor markets in Cuyahoga County (Cleveland) and Lorain County, Ohio. Job opportunity indices are then compared for different types of neighborhoods. Results indicate that neighborhood job opportunities do not vary much by neighborhood income level or metropolitan location. However, predominantly African-American neighborhoods at low- and moderate-income levels endure job opportunities far below those of similarly placed white neighborhoods. Fewer than average job opportunities near lower income black neighborhoods make it harder for people without access to private automobiles or reliable mass transit to obtain jobs.     

Moving from Public Housing to Homeownership: Perceived Barriers to Program Participation and Success

Abstract: The goals of public housing have evolved from providing shelter to providing opportunities for escaping from welfare and buying one's own home. Despite numerous federal policies aimed at enhancing resident self‐sufficiency and homeownership through programs run by local public housing authorities, little is known about who participates and who succeeds. This study explores barriers to participation and success in an innovative resident self‐sufficiency/homeownership program developed by the Housing Authority of the city and county of Denver. We conduct surveys of participants in the Foundations for Homeownership program, eliciting their perceptions regarding willingness and ability to participate in the program and, thereafter, completing it successfully. We find that at time of entry into the program, participants reported, on average, 4.6 major barriers that they perceive would limit their ability to achieve current goals. OLS and logistic regression analyses were conducted to ascertain the degree to which perceived barriers were associated with participants’ demographic, economic, or attitudinal characteristics.     

The rhythms of project life: a longitudinal analysis of work hours and work–life experiences in construction

A diary data collection method was used to collect data from project‐based construction workers in a large civil engineering construction project in Melbourne, Australia. Data capturing the number of hours worked, satisfaction with work–life balance and capacity to complete required tasks at work and at home were collected for 21 consecutive weeks. A strong correlation was found between hours worked each week and participants’ work–life experiences. Data were subjected to time series modelling procedures and weekly work hours were found to significantly predict participants’ capacity to complete tasks at work and at home, but not their satisfaction with work–life balance. The impact of work leading up to a major project milestone was found to increase the predictive capacity of the time series models, indicating that project events have a significant impact upon the work–life experiences of project‐based workers. The period of intense work prior to the milestone (the opening of a new ramp on to an operating freeway) contributed significantly to an immediate reduction in capacity to complete tasks at home. Further time series modelling revealed that recovery opportunities associated with workers taking a short, temporary break from work can also contribute to improved work–life balance. It is proposed that construction organizations use the naturally fluctuating workloads implicit in project work to ‘build’ recovery opportunities into project schedules.