The University of Liverpool has been awarded more than one million pounds in funding to design a “revolutionary” assistive device to support and enhance upper body movement in children and young people living with progressive neuromuscular diseases. The university was awarded £1.25 million from the People’s Postcode Lottery Dream Fund to design the first-of-its-kind exoskeleton […]
Uni wins £1.25m funding to design transformative exoskeleton suit for disabled young people
Caroline Collier, CEO of Inclusion Barnet, talks about how the Trust’s Strengthening Voices, Realising Rights programme is supporting Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations (DDPOs).
Imagine you’re a woman leading an organisation devoted to women’s rights, working hard to attract funding to promote your cause. Challenging of course, but if you do good work and tell your story in the right way, you will hopefully sustain your organisation and be able to meet at least some of your goals.
Now imagine doing that in a slightly alternative world where the women’s rights organisation you run has to compete for funding with lots of other women’s rights organisations, but with a key difference: almost all your competitors are run largely by men. Imagine that these men-led groups have stronger brands, greater resources, the confidence of funders and the ear of government when it comes to setting out what they believe women want. Imagine that the biggest problem you’re battling is that no one can really conceive of an effective organisation being run by women anyway, because you’re not seen as competent, so everyone’s happy for women’s rights groups to be run by men on their behalf.
As hellish as I trust that sounds, it’s largely analogous to what Deaf and Disabled People’s Organisations (DDPOs) face in the UK today. As mostly local, grassroots organisations, it’s hard to compete against the big disability charities (largely run by non-disabled people), build a brand or gain traction with our messaging. We are mostly under the radar of the public at large. Nonetheless, there are DDPOs up and down the country quietly doing some amazing work, and ready for opportunities to do more.
Read in full at…
Source: https://www.trustforlondon.org.uk/news/why-funders-must-take-a-new-approach-to-disability/
By Barrier Free Japan
January 9 2022
JAPAN – Recent incidents at railway crossings in Japan involving people with disabilities have led people to ask how such incidents can be avoided.
Such tragedies are becoming a common occurrence in Japan. For example, on January 28th 2021, a local group for visually impaired people submitted a request to Tobu Railway to strengthen measures to prevent falls after an accident in which a visually impaired man fell and died at a station in Itabashi Ward, Tokyo.
This accident occurred on January 28 2021, when a visually impaired man in his 60s fell on to a railroad track at Shimo-Akatsuka Station on the Tobu-Tojo Line in Itabashi Ward and was hit by a train and died.
Three months before the accident, groups representing the visually impaired in Itabashi Ward and Toshima Ward submitted a request to Tobu Railway to strengthen fall prevention measures…
View original post 270 more words
| Being mobile and able to travel in later life is linked to a good quality of life. Against a backdrop of an increase in the number of older people in the UK and an increase in the amount of travel per person for this age group, the number of older people using the railway is in decline. The purpose of this paper was to report on an investigation on issues around accessibility and information provision for older rail passengers. Download in full here |
The system automatically extends a stainless ramp when a train arrives at a station platform.
This is the first device in Japan that simultaneously eliminates any vertical or horizontal gap between the platform and the train door
From Jiji Press
November 17 2021
OSAKA – West Japan Railway Co said Wednesday that it has developed an automatic ramp system designed to help wheelchair users get on and off trains. The system automatically extends a stainless ramp when a train arrives at a station platform.
This is the first device in Japan that simultaneously eliminates any vertical or horizontal gap between the platform and the train door, according to the company, better known as JR West.
JR West plans to conduct demonstration tests until February next year, aiming to put it into practical use in a few years.
The ramp is about 3.6 meters wide and some 1.5 meters long. When a censor at a station detects that a train has stopped, the ramp installed at the end of the platform will automatically come out in about five seconds, causing no delay in the train schedule.
Cpeanose 