That's why here in Germany we have a separate term for that: "barrierefrei", which means "free of barriers". It is the politically correct variant of the other popular word "behindertengerecht" which merely means "suitable for disabled people".

Many people here think that "barrierefrei" is just about political correctness for its own sake. But the term "barrierefrei" emphases a completely different way of thinking about this issue: It is about removing barriers for everyone, with disabled people being the most important target group, but by far not the only one.

Political correctness tends to shut down discussions, empathy extends them.

PC is prescriptive, empathy is descriptive.

Of course, PC only works if you are doing it on your own, not if you impose it on the people you are trying to convince.

But it's a bit weird to equate empathy for a condition beyond one's control with empathy for people who don't choose to use empathetic language.

I've been in a few classes or workshops where the instructors have taught people how to correct insensitive speech. It's something that can be done well.

http://www.dianegoodman.com/documents/RespondingToBiasedOrOf...

Personal anecdote: I was playing a game in college with some other students. One was periodically bragging about some particular sexual exploit in a roundabout way. I think he was looking for validation, but when he didn't get it, he tried again. I said something along the lines of, "That comment isn't acceptable and if you keep saying things like that I'm not going to play with you." It was definitely confrontational, it drew a line in the sand, and I didn't hear him say inappropriate comments for the months that we played together.

Half the struggle here is just deciding that someone else's behavior isn't acceptable and that you want to do something about it.

Personally I translate it to 'good manners'.

I suppose there is some chance that they are being slightly more sophisticated and making the argument that the expectations are strictly performative. But I doubt it.

The use of political correct terms makes people mad because it contains within it an implication that they are being rude, and often the person coming up with these euphemisms has not the faintest idea whether the existing term was offensive or not!

That's probably true, given that "happy holidays" predates "political correctness" by more than a few decades.

But as an atheist of Jewish descent, what do I say to my co-workers, who are from Turkey, India, Korea and China? Of those who I know to follow a religion, none are Christian. It would feel outright silly to say "Merry Christmas".

(For comparison, try saying "Happy Hanukkah" to your non-Jewish friends as a non-Jewish person when the season comes, and see if it makes much sense to you).

My question is more whether you care if someone you don't know says it to you on the street or when you buy a coffee or whatever.

On the other hand, different people are rubbed the wrong way by many different things. I do try to avoid going out of my way to avoid offending people, by, say, assuming they're Christians. And on the other, other hand, I'm fine with offending people who want to go out of their way to be offended.

I know that the term "barrierefrei" is PC, and I know that quite a lot of people will hate it for that reason alone. I use it nevertheless, because I think that PC terminology is actually a good thing (to be used, not to be enforced), and that "barrierefrei" is an especially well-chosen term.

The most "anti-PC" people in the US have their own jargon and codewords and "safe spaces" with all the same restrictions, just turned on their heads. For instance, there are very few places you could go where people would tell you to your face that black lives don't matter, but a much larger set of places where it wouldn't be "PC" to wear a Black Lives Matter shirt.

There's also something called 'decompression therapy' that supposedly helped youths with psychopathy become less psychopathic.

The theory as I understand it goes like this: Everyone has a 'sphere of empathy', they empathize with those inside it but not outside. To a psychopath that boundary is their own skin, to a vegetarian it includes all animals, to a pescatarian all land animals... you get the idea. What makes people's sphere of empathy expand is feeling safe and empathized with, it allows them to risk the vulnerability of empathizing with someone who might betray them. But it's like voluntarily relaxing a muscle - the process is slow, and while the right pressure can help the problem point relax, too much pressure will make it tense up more.

e.g. ESPN pulling veteran announcer Robert Lee off a University of Virginia football game because his name is too close to Robert E. Lee, the Confederate general is an example of political correctness in action, and that has nothing to do with treating people fairly (certainly the announcer wasn't treated fairly in this through no fault of his own), but to prevent the risk that someone might get offended;

Censoring Huckleberry Finn (for having the n-word in it, despite being a great anti-racist novel of the time) done at some institutions was another example of political correctness - again, there's nothing in the act about treating people fairly, it's simply a fight against "taboo" words or thought, and that is pretty Stalinist in some aspects.

Pretty sure that the announcer himself asked to be moved to another game.

This is something that bears repeating. Accessibility means making things accessible for everyone, not just people with disabilities. It's much easier to push a heavy dolly up a ramp, than it is to pull it up lips, steps, etc. Self opening doors are a god send when carrying packages.

Until I broke my ankle in a bicycle accident last year. Then I became acutely aware of how poor some of the infrastructure is around me. The closest subway station to me doesn't have an elevator, for example, and the one nearest work only has a single elevator at one end of the platform that is often out of service. I supported accessibility standards in theory before this, but now that I've seen how they play out in practice, I strongly and emphatically support them. Empathy is hugely important.

I am also so goddamn thankful that there is the requirement to have sturdy handrails alongside all flights of stairs, and that this requirement is strictly enforced (thank the ADA or building codes or whatever is responsible). With these handrails, an otherwise able-bodied person on crutches can handle staircases relatively easily. Without them, stairs are death traps, especially going down. I would have been mostly confined to my apartment without the existence of these handrails. Fortunately, they exist everywhere, so I was able to tackle the stairs at my apartment, at the subway station, at work, and in the entrances to buses.

Another "temporary disability" that most people don't think of is carrying a baby. Suddenly, doors that can be operated one-handed (or even better, hands-free) are wonderful when you're trying to get your kid someplace where you can change that blow-out.

He had no idea how to check which stations were handicap-accessible and which weren't, and when we showed him, it turns out he would have to go halfway further into Brooklyn, then get on a bus just to undo the journey above-ground. At something like 1 or 2am, too.

He just sort of deflated when he realized the journey ahead of him, so we just offered to lug him up the stairs, and did. Good thing he wasn't there alone.

It's not 'empathy' if you don't notice it until it affects you personally, or you're only doing something because it might affect you in the future.

Being affected personally at one time can (and, I assume, often does) help one develop empathy, though.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/design/inclusive

Maybe you’re normally fully abled but you benefit when you’re a new parent carrying a child, sprain an ankle, etc.

The framing of short/mid/long-term is really nice for breaking the self/other empathy gap.

No kidding. I'm a large person with a weightlifting hobby - so about as able bodied as a person can get - but after a frustrating experience of moving into a very poorly designed apartment building, I've started seeking out impediment-free spaces.

There's just so much unnecessary bologna, pointless stairs, poorly placed ramps, etc. are all functionally the equivalent of traffic and poorly timed traffic lights: they're taxes we pay with time and frustration because some designer made poor decisions.

If we're collectively paying for something, we're the boss and we have the gold so we make the rules. That means open source code, functional designs, and comprehensive cost-effective management.

Sure you're able bodied today. But if you're lucky enough to live to an old age, your body won't be what it was. And you could be hit by a car tomorrow and paralyzed.

It might be appropriate for them and the community. We don't need sidewalks connecting farms, and maybe if the neighborhood wasn't built with walkability / accessiblity in mind, people who need walkability / accessiblity don't live there and it'd be burdensome and wasteful to make it more accessible than anyone demands it to be.

I think it's weird to make sidewalks your hill to die on but without context it seems like it could be a reasonable policy decision.

IMO, it's a way to fight the in-demand construction for today, which is medium density apartments, and more kids looking for access to the schools.

There's a lot of dynamics at play. People who own property don't like the mandates because they potentially impact the value of the subdivided value (the builder makes the sidewalks, the municipality maintains them), many people don't want more people & school enrollment because that drives taxes, and old people are afraid of people who ride the bus for various reasons.

Yes. The first time we took our daughter on a subway trip in the city, and had to take many escalators to get from street to platform, back to street, was a real eye opener.

We will never have perfect sidewalks, it's a noble goal, but it's pie-in-the-sky thinking to want perfect sidewalks. Instead, we should be building better accessibility devices, ones that can navigate tough terrain. Why are the wheels on mobility devices so damn small? Can they be made to be swappable so you can put on the outdoor wheels when you're travelling, and indoor ones when you want something smooth and quiet?

We'll never have perfect anything. But I think you're being more than a bit defeatist here. I'm in the US Northeast and the sidewalk in my house was installed in 2008. Still basically flawless today. As homeowners, we accept that we need a new roof every 25 years because the consequences are real and tangible to us. I have to think that sidewalks are just part of the cost of living in a walkable community, even if we don't walk that much.

A few communities down, they require sidewalk maintenance for residents if the pavers are uneven at all. It's a very affluent borough, but you'll see people grind down the edges of the sidewalk that stick up in order to meet the code. So you can maintain without replacing.

And besides, we don't have this logic for roads. I mean, SUVs can handle anything, so why bother with all of this even pavement with good drainage?

>Instead, we should be building better accessibility devices, ones that can navigate tough terrain.

You're being downvoted for the first paragraph, but I think your second paragraph is sensible. My running stroller is way better at handling broken sidewalks than the scissor stroller with tiny wheels that fits great in a small trunk and works well at the mall. Strollers aren't super expensive (at least not $30k like that wheelchair) so I can have more than one and use the best one for my situation.

We see concept robots that can handle rough terrain. Wouldn't it be great if that got integrated into wheelchairs somehow?

That's kind of why I'm being defeatist. You just need a ton of money to keep sidewalks in good order. And you need the people that live in the area to care enough to report the issues.

>You're being downvoted for the first paragraph, but I think your second paragraph is sensible.

Yeah, I was really trying to setup the second paragraph to be impactful, but I don't think people got that far.

No, you don't. You just need to make them properly the first time and keep people from planting trees where they don't belong.

In my parents house in Canuckistan, I've never seen them fix the side-walks in 20 years and they're mostly fine.

Southeast Ontario, New York, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. will re-freeze near the surface dozens of times every winter, and each time, more pavement damage is possible. Halite and other ice-melting chemicals can exacerbate the problem by making the ice in or under different parts of the pavement freeze at different temperatures.

You don't even need to do it properly the first time. You can seal pavements (and the underlying soil) against moisture infiltration at any time. Dropping a layer of asphalt on top is a common way to do this after the initial construction. Many places in the US simply do not bother, because that would cost a lot more up front, and then there would be fewer maintenance contracts to hand out. There's always the possibility that no one will ever complain, and the problem can be ignored forever--that's money that never needs to be budgeted.

If you build a proper foundation for a sidewalk, and then seal it against moisture, it will stay smooth and level for hundreds of freeze-thaw cycles, barring some natural disaster that would let the water underneath it. But if you're only mayor for two years, and the sidewalks last 30, nobody is going to come back to you 20 years after you leave office and pat you on the back for your wise sidewalk decisions. It is more likely that there will be some crisis right before the election and the money that could have solved it already went into great sidewalks. Or even worse, if you're a subdivision developer, you're out of there a year after the last lot gets sold, long before anyone notices how many corners you cut on the sidewalks.

All of this comes back to the prevailing attitudes in the US about who should be responsible for community infrastructure. We often expect private entities to build it, and public entities to maintain it. This screws up all the incentives. The reality is that subdivision developers probably should not exist. The municipality should be performing that function, instead of annexing every ad-hoc, ex-farmland housing development that springs up on the borders. That's how you get straight streets that connect at both ends, and good sidewalks that go everywhere that cars can. And then you can fire the zoning board, because when you build all the streets, you can control all the lot sizes and business parking requirements directly.

We do have some problems with ZOAB-based paved roads if the freeze/thaw cycles are too high, but any big problems are repaired in two or three days, and all roads are maintained and replaced relatively quickly anyway, so it's not a big deal.

It's strange to see the broken roads and patchwork in the US. Every time I visit I wonder why there is no majority that agrees on fixing it. Short term "it works now" is such a bad idea...

When weed seeds fall into a crack and germinate, the roots dig down into the sandy substrate looking for soil. If you prepare the foundation correctly, the weeds die before establishing a viable foothold. So then you have a choice. Pull the weed out, and the crack widens and a little bit more of the substrate is disturbed, or let it stay there and decay, leaving some nutrients. Either way, they next weed seed that lands there will have a much easier time of it. No matter what you do, decaying organic matter will eventually filter down under the sidewalk surface, and something will be able to grow in it. Temperate evergreen pines and magnolias drop leaves all the time--not just in autumn--so you would have to sweep them off daily.

Ants just love making huge excavations one grain of sand at a time. If you build a brick sidewalk, and do not continually spray it with ant-killing insecticides, you will eventually experience a big section of it collapsing into swarming ants, possibly without any obvious prior indications that ants were digging under the sidewalk.

Surely you see the comedy in that statement? I don't think anything happens right the first time. And preventing people from doing anything is pretty tough as well!

How is equipping everyone with expensive wheelchairs a better solution than enforcing a standardized construction code?

And how do wheels help someone when they're trying to jog on a sidewalk?

This is irrationally pessimistic.

Nothing is perfect, but there is a huge, meaningful difference between slightly flawed and completely flawed. It doesn't need to be perfect. It just needs to be good enough.

Many things _can_ be done decently well the first time. Often times it just takes a small cultural mindset shift, and some minor improvements to the approach.

Some of the mentioned sidewalks are one hundred years old, and are thoroughly decayed as a result. I bet if every road you had to drive on was in that condition then you'd be upset about it and would demand repairs, rather than just throwing up your hands at the inevitability of entropy. Maybe you want to go live out in primitive conditions in the jungle somewhere, but the rest of us want civilization. Your logic applies equally to roads as it does to sidewalks, so should we just give up on them as well?

No, but I wouldn't drive a low-riding sports car if I lived in an area with crappy roads. I'd buy a pickup truck with good suspension and large knobby tires.

The problem is that accessibility devices don't have the option of "good suspension and large knobby tires".

Every problem that woman experiences is because her wheelchair is not built for the environment she operates in. We need better wheelchairs. Yelling at local state government to fix sidewalks will not work. There are millions of miles of sidewalks to fix and hundreds of thousands of people responsible for them. You can't change that quickly. But you can build a better wheelchair.

Again, I don't think you read the article. The sidewalks are in the best condition in cities like Boston, where they are the responsibility of the city. Cities are already responsible for constructing and maintaining roads; is it really so crazy that they do the same for the sidewalks that are built adjacent to roads? In what way does it make sense having hundreds of thousands of individual owners of patches of sidewalk 20 m long? You're throwing away all economies of scale there.

Good sidewalks benefit everyone. I've almost injured myself from tripping over a particularly uneven patch of sidewalk, and many people have actually injured themselves. The elderly and the blind who walk won't benefit from better wheelchairs, but they certainly will benefit from better, flatter sidewalks. Everyone benefits.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IBOT

Who used to fix sidewalks among other things.

Then I read the second one. Wow. You've internalized the "have bad infrastructure and get an SUV" mentality. We're not paving the world. We're paving a small part of our environment where people live. Yes strollers have stupid wheels. But having good infrastructure in a small area means I don't need a techno-distopian robot walking me everywhere.

There aren't always perfect solutions to problems. Sometimes futurologists are found waiting for the perfect, inexhaustible source of energy to power the world, but the practical consensus is that our renewable world be a mix of solar, wind, hydro, and some sort of more-advanced atom-splitting. Find multiple angles to chip away at the problem until you get where you want to go.

I don't think it's unreasonable to say "let's try to get all sidewalk cracks under an inch" and then say "let's get wheelchairs that can handle an inch-high crack", as an arbitrary example.

I mean, if we want to talk about unintended benefits - my most mobile stroller was purchased as a running stroller to be used on a rail-to-trail, then I found out it could handle bad sidewalks pretty well. Isn't that the same argument as my top-level post, just from the opposite side?

How is that different from roads?

> you can't depend on people to maintain the sidewalks in front of their property

"in front of their property" is one way of looking at this; "alongside a road" is another.

Logically, if the state were going to cover the costs of one of them, it'd be sidewalks, since they can be used by all taxpayers. You could have road users pay tolls to pay for the roads, and people who don't drive could simply opt out.

(1) Not always and usually in moderation, but definitely sometimes.

In our country, our roads, bike roads and sidewalks all have to adhere to the same base set of rules, everywhere. They all have to be there, be maintained and it's not optional. If you have a sidewalk in front of your house and you want to clean/maintain/service it, that's great, but the country will check it, clean it, maintain it. We have sidewalk-streetcleaners about once a month, driving to every sidewalk and if any structural damage or loss of markings is seen, it's noted and fixed during the next maintenance round.

Regarding ramps (as outlined in the article), there is a guarantee that you will always have a clear path between two points, with no hard barriers. So no fences in the wrong place, ramps always facing ramps on the other side of the street, all with the same inclination. No hard edges, everything is rounded off ever so slightly (reduces wear/tripping/hooking dirt), and it's against the law to block any of it.

Trees are certainly an issue.