Community Building Tip: Car-Free

[ysabetwordsmith]

For my current set of tips, I'm using the list "101 Small Ways You Can Improve Your City.

44. Organize a local car-free day. Every September 22 cities around the world participate in a global Car-Free Day, showcasing the possibilities of a more progressive commute and the advantages of walkable streets and biking infrastructure. Want to be inspired? Check out 14 beautiful car-free cities.

Regrettably, neither of the sites seemed to say anything about accessibility.  Now if you're blind, not worrying about getting run over by a car could be a great thing.  But for anyone with mobility issues, more often than not "car-free" might as well be "on the Moon."  And it's not like we don't have solutions for that, I just didn't see anyone advertising things like palanquins for places where wheelchairs can't easily go.  So if you're lobbying for car-free areas, remember to make them accessible to everyone.  Even normally able-bodied people can be screwed the moment they break a foot, get pregnant, or have a baby carriage to push.

Comments

Re: Thoughts

[(Anonymous)]

Hmmm...I wonder if Kenzie, the Undertaker, or the centaurs would ever want to be taught to do therapy riding.

>>Good luck with that. Nobody's obligated to help you, and if you annoy them may simply hang up.<<

As a former customer service associate, I have two ideas that might mitigate (but not neccesarily eliminate) the issue:

1) Be nice to the person. Stay calm, thank them for their patience, explain that you know this may be a complicated or unusual request. If they are nice or helpful, compliment them on that.

Even if most of the people are unhelpful jerks, the one nice one might know who you should call to complain, or what competitors might have better services - and they're more likely to tell you that stuff if you are 'Annoyed but polite' vs yelling 'You're all scam artists! Angrish!'.

(A couple of times, I've ephasized those customer service surveys when a customer complains about a policy and I agree with them.)

2) Call or visit at a slow time when possible. And you can ask, too: "I need to ask about [topic], and it might take awhile. Is now a good time? No? When should I call back and who should I ask for?" (CSAs may get blamed for ignoring customers event to attend aanother customer, so a half-hour phone call is best done at non-rush times.)

I mean, it still might not work, but from the other side of the counter, it maybe ups the odds?

And I'm pretty sure that some of the akwardness is the person going '****, I don't know what to do, or how to find out what I should do' in their internal monologue.

>>That is so awesome.<<

We never had to carry people, but the middle-aged to older vendors apprecited the help with tents, handmade wooden furniture, and the like.

And I got talking to some interesting people. One former student told me how they'd taken over a campus building for three days to protest sexist rules (curfews & no pants, I think.) The guys in the protest added a demand to be able to buy beer on campus. LOL.

>>Friends or relatives often do such things, but there is no guarantee they will be abled either. <<

Exactly! Plus it is kind of exhausting (and aggravating) to have to lug several hundred pounds of gear on a /family vacation/.

>>Frex, retirees often travel in groups and may not have enough muscle for heaving a chair over obstacles. <<

My surviving grandparent and I traveled together when I was in my late teens. I was dubbed a 'good traveling companion,' as I carried the luggage, don't argue about the scheduling, and keept an eye out for other odds and ends (loose cobblestones, stampeding schoolchildren) that may require assistance.

>>Brilliant, and saved for future reference. It would suit the Rutledge thread very well.<<

Thank you! I look forward to reading it!

I think you already have a wilderness parks idea in one story...

...and I imagine if it works it could actually be a very common pattern in T-America, especially as they have more multilingual people.

This could actually be generalized to any 'labor' group - store, stockers, moving crews, construction crews, cleaning services...

Even a gravedigging crew! (I knew someone whose job was to dig graves, set up for funerals, & occasionally get signatures. Honestly, more 'politely hovering in the background' than actual talking.) Have 2-3 people on the 'cemetary crew' for maintenence and stuff, and as long as someone (maybe even the offsite boss, or paperwork person) can translate, you're good.