Topography with a side of ableism

Jesus Bleeping Christ Almighty on a Pizza Crust with a Russian all-female punk band in neon colored hand-knit balaklavas on the side!!!

RantWoman, CHILL! Breathe! Breathe! TRY to stay somewhere in the vicinity of your main thread.

Okay, main threads:
--meeting campus topography
--referrals to services provided by tenants
--Visions of projects that MIGHT come.

So help RantWoman, if she gets asked / told by one more apparently able-bodied person not to trouble her pretty little (loudmouthed, highly opinionated) head about accessibility for a new tenant, Ambassador Thwack, the Anger Management Consultant and Sidekick the service python are BOTH going to get deployed.

(RantWoman makes exception for Friend who ASKED RantWoman about signage, even though RantWoman could easily make room for twitchiness about time sequence. Stay tuned in a different post)

NewMeetinghouse tenant will be having homeless people drop by during the day to pick up items of need. RantWoman does not really understand the program super well, but is clear to opine about accessibility anyway.

One path to services involves a lot of stairs and possibly a walk uphill from a bus stop with a segment probably too steep for a manual wheelchair user to  attempt alone. Between the stairs and the steep grade, this walking segment would get near 0 probability in a hypothetical tricked out wayfinding app that wheelchair users will even want to see the routing.

Luckily there is another physical / communications route. It involves being able to phone ahead and either meet someone or finding the wheelchair accessible path partway to the office.

RantWoman observations:

Typically at least 20-25% of the people staying at Meeting through SHARE used some kind of cane or mobility device or had limbs in casts, RantWoman expects those served by new tenant will percentage wise include a similar proportion of people with visible disabilities, never mind the invisible ones that can also limit mobility.

RantWoman remembers a moment actually before Ambassador Thwack came into her life. RantWoman had an arm in a cast and was standing in a food bank line. Someone came out and asked RantWoman whether she wanted to cut ahead. Um no, but RantWoman wanted to make sure the young woman on crutches with two kids in two DID get to cut. RantWoman does not remember the visible disability breakdown of the rest of the line but she things it was way above the percentage above.

In other words, Meeting topography could be a barrier to a considerably percentage of those seeking services from New Tenant. People who need something usually are pretty determined to overcome barriers, but that does not mean their day gets easier having to do so.

Enter RantWoman. When RantWoman is not geeking out about transportation, RantWoman spends a good bit of time making referrals. Look RantWoman is not your fairy godmother and Agency X or Program Y  will get you to help that works much faster than talking to RantWoman. And yeah, sometimes the Ask a Human algorithm is way more helpful than Trip Planners and yes, RantWoman CAN give additional pointers sometimes for that last 50 / 100/ 1000 feet of a trip, like for instance all the wayfinding minutia above. So RantWoman MEANS to read up a little better and probably put new tenant into the brainspace where RantWoman stores good referrals.

Okay, RantWoman, but the ongoing operations right now are not really your circus and not really your monkeys.

Um, stay tuned for the time sequence meditation. Aside from the time sequence issue,  RantWoman will feel adequately present in the conversation if Friends just put out there in the ether the POSSIBILITY   that at some point more conversations about possible modifications to enhance accessibility might be quite on point.

(Yes, RantWoman is aware she may be asking for the sun moon and stars. Cope! RantWoman also gets to cope with a clump of Friends trying to cut down the angry frustrated email from RantWoman. So far said clump means well, but they are also doing just as well as everyone else about supplying RantWoman reasons to be....)