26 April 07
Design for the disabled
Thank you all for telling me what the steel plates are about. When I traveled on mrt the other day, I took an extra look at it and indeed, it led to the lift, checkpoints and counter. It starts with strips and when it reaches its end point (lift or checkpoint), the pattern changed to dots.
Though some people think that it is a waste of money but I think it is for a good cause. We did a research paper on universal design and design for disabled back in university, and we learned that it is absolutely much cheaper to design with all these considerations before building. It costs much more to renovate later on.
When we have the freedom to walk and move around, sometimes we forget how inconvenient it is when we lose this freedom. When the new semester started, I met another student who was wheelchair bound. His grandmother is always there for him to help him at school. It was heartbreaking. Simple thing like pressing the lift button, and using the toilet are extremely difficult for him.

When I was in Korea, the basin and bathtub in hotels were built very low. (as you can see from the picture) I had to bow literally 90 degrees to wash my face. I found it weird at first but when I came to realize that it was convenient for the disabled, I was impressed. I stayed in 4 hotels and all of them had low bathtubs and basins.

Of course, this toilet is not for the disabled. But I found it very cute because I don’t get to see this toilet much in Singapore. I took me awhile to figure out where to face when I was peeing. *smile sheepishly)
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