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Kerb cuts, the small ramps where a pavement meets the road, were won by disabled campaigners for wheelchair users. They now help anyone pushing a pram, pulling a suitcase or wheeling a trolley.

Smithsonian / Stanford Social Innovation Review

TechnologyMindDesign

The story behind the card

Kalamazoo, Michigan, installed some of the first kerb cuts in the 1940s, in a pilot scheme proposed by the lawyer and war veteran Jack H. Fischer to help disabled veterans get to work. In the 1970s the Center for Independent Living in Berkeley, California, a group run by disabled people and co-founded by Ed Roberts, pushed for cuts along Telegraph and Shattuck Avenues, creating one of the first continuous step-free routes through an American city. The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 later made kerb ramps a legal requirement on new and altered streets across the United States. In 2017 the policy advocate Angela Glover Blackwell named the wider pattern the 'curb-cut effect': a change made for one group often ends up helping almost everyone.

Türkçe oku
Kaldırımın yola indiği yerdeki küçük rampalar, tekerlekli sandalye kullananlar için engellilerin verdiği mücadeleyle yapıldı. Bugün bebek arabası iten, valiz çeken, alışveriş arabası süren herkesin işine yarıyor.

Kaldırım rampalarının ilk örneklerinden biri 1940'larda ABD'nin Michigan eyaletindeki Kalamazoo kentinde yapıldı. Fikir, engelli gazilerin işe gidebilmesini isteyen avukat ve savaş gazisi Jack H. Fischer'dan çıkmıştı. 1970'lerde Kaliforniya'nın Berkeley kentinde, engellilerin kendi yönettiği ve Ed Roberts'ın kurucuları arasında olduğu Bağımsız Yaşam Merkezi, Telegraph ve Shattuck caddeleri boyunca rampa yapılmasını sağladı. Böylece bir Amerikan kentinde tekerlekli sandalyeyle basamağa takılmadan baştan sona gidilebilen ilk yollardan biri açıldı. 1990'da çıkan Engelli Amerikalılar Yasası, yeni yapılan ve yenilenen sokaklarda rampayı ülke genelinde zorunlu kıldı. Politika uzmanı Angela Glover Blackwell 2017'de bu örüntüye “kaldırım rampası etkisi” adını verdi: Bir grup için yapılan düzenleme çoğu zaman neredeyse herkesin işine yarar.

Sources and further reading

Background reading: Curb cut effect
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