Our team at Designbridge is constantly on the look out to design and develop affordable products, solutions and services to make built environment around us more accessible for ALL people, including people with disabilities. With this in mind, we are focusing voluntarily on three important projects currently.
1.Design and Development of Portable Unisex Accessible Toilet block ( Urban locations )
( Representative image displayed above. Designbridge team is currently in the process of developing a design for a contextually relevant and economically viable model for accessible public toilet block for urban use in India )
Public toilets remain the single most neglected and much needed basic built infrastructure requirement in most cities of India. In a country still struggling to deal with the creation and maintenance of clean and hygienic public toilet system for the citizens at large, it is not surprising at all that the sanitation needs for persons with disabilities are completely ignored. In addition to taking care of the special needs of persons with disabilities, these toilets will also cater to the needs of women, children, elderly people and people with medical conditions.
Present status of project – The requirement analysis has been completed and the design development phase is in progress.
2. Design and Development of Accessible Bank ATM centres
click here to view the animation in your media player -atm01
Most of the banking sector pays little or no heed to the requirements of their customers with disabilities. Nearly all banks and their ATM centres are located in rented premises, which is often cited as a reason for not being able to make changes to the built environment in terms of provision of ramps or accessible toilets as most of these premises are designed by architects and interior designers keeping an able bodied user in mind, and owned by individuals or builders who due to lack of awareness do not consider accessibility as a prerequisite for owning or developing real estate.
Most of the ramps constructed for ATM centres have incorrect and steep gradient making them virtually redundant and pose a threat to safety and well being of the wheel chair users who may dare to use them for access.
Designbridge is working on developing a prototype for a standalone accessible ATM center, which may serve as a guideline for facility managers and banks while expanding to new locations for setting up ATM centres, or for retrofitting the existing ATM centers to make them accessible to wheelchair users , persons with visual impairments and senior citizens.
Present status of project – Preliminary design completed. Detail design development stage in progress.
3. Design and development of affordable indoor navigation and wayfinding system for pesrons with visual impairment ( blindness )
Current status – Concept design stage