empirica supports the ‘MapMyDay’ campaign, a worldwide mapping event taking place on International Day of Persons with Disabilities (3 December) and initiated by Berlin NGO Sozialhelden e.V. and the World Health Organization (WHO). People worldwide are asked to mark the public places they come to during the day on Wheelmap.org, an online map for wheelchair accessible places developed by Sozialhelden.
The campaign specifically not only addresses people with a disability: “Barriers affect many people: Seniors, children, families. With the campaign ‘MapMyDay’ we want to start a worldwide movement to call attention to barriers and to eliminate them in the best of cases”, says activist Raíl Krauthausen, the inventor of Wheelmap.org.
To prepare for the event, all who are interested can inform themselves on the website www.mapmyday.org to find out how they can be part of the movement as an individual, with friends, colleagues or familiy members, in their clubs, schools or associations. The makers of Wheelmap are offering a simple get-involved-campaign with “MapMyDay”. All one needs is access to the internet. It is really easy: log in with a smartphone or computer, select a place and choose between “fully, partially or not wheelchair accessible”. That is all there is to it.
On the one hand, “MapMyDay” aims to make more information available to people about their environment. “Does my favorite café have a step at the entrance? Could I enter the supermarket around the corner in a wheelchair without a problem? Which nearby subway stations have an elevator? The answers to these questions benefit everyone”, says Raíl Krauthausen. Simultaneously, the campaign seeks to raise awareness for the barriers that people with mobility impairments and families with baby carriages are confronted with on a daily basis.
One of the partners of ‘MapMyDay’ is MyAccessible.EU, the awareness platform of EU research project CAP4Access, coordinated by empirica. CAP4Access (2014-2016) is developing and piloting innovative ICT tools which support wheelchair users and other people with limited physical mobility in negotiating the city. The project also addresses other urban stakeholders by helping them boost accessibility of the built environment in European cities. Project coordinator Karsten Gareis is proud of its contribution to ‘MapMyDay’: “The campaign will help raise awareness about the challenge of accessibility across the world, and it will give a boost to all kinds of grassroots initiatives working to make life easier for the large number of people with limited mobility.”
More information about “MapMyDay” is available on the campaign’s website www.mapmyday.org, on Facebook, Twitter and with the hashtag #mapmyday.
For more information on CAP4Access, coordinated by empirica, visit www.cap4access.eu and www.MyAccessible.eu.
