What is it?
The design of urban spaces in a way that is suitable for disabled individuals is essential for inclusive urban mobility.
B-point is a mobile application which displays to the user how accessible various spaces in the city such as restaurants, hotels, cafes and movie theaters are. Considering the 7 million affected disabled individuals plus almost 8 million people who are their family and friends, the places included in the app are expected to create a competitive environment. The project aims to increase the number of accessible spaces as more establishments reevaluate their designs thanks to this competition. The end goal is to have disabled individuals move about the city more freely and comfortably and have an active participation in social life and to rid them of the feelings of isolation and increase their self-confidence. Thus the aim is a more diverse urban mobility where different segments of the society are represented, and a society where people respect differences and understand others in city life.
Why?
Around the world an estimated 1 billion disabled people, 7 million of them living in Turkey, are left out of social life because they weren’t taken into account in the infrastructure of cities .
In Istanbul, one of the largest and most vibrant metropolises in the world, the needs of the disabled were ignored when spaces and the transportation network were designed and hence one segment of the population remain underrepresented. Therefore, urban mobility is not inclusive. While in Istanbul, the number of daily commutes between two points reach 30 million, individuals with disabilities, who comprise a significant portion of the population, are forced to spend most of their time at home since they are unable to move independently in spaces that were not designed with accessibility in mind. When disabled individuals are unable to do what they want freely and to interact with the rest of the society, this brings about feelings of loneliness, eloq and isolation.