I arrived in London to complete my Everything is Possible in Life Cycle ride nearly 3 weeks ago. Back home, when I first sat in my powered wheelchair again (having spent a month on the road without it), I felt like I was being given some independence back. For 32 days, when I wasn’t cycling, I was being pushed in a lightweight manual chair. Finally I’d regained more autonomy I thought.
But my initial enthusiasm hadn’t accounted for the sense of liberation I had experienced under my own steam in the trike for some 730 miles, as well as the awful experience of daily living in urban built environments.
Being able to pedal autonomously and pretty much where I wanted was a precious feeling which I had forgotten. I’ve got too used to crowded multi-level city environments. With all the steps, the street furniture and the lack of drop-curbs, as well as the lack of space with too many cars and too many people in too little space, is it really any wonder why wheelchair users are virtually invisible in cities like London?
From Aberdeen all the way to Trafalgar Square, I was confronted by 6 cycle barriers stopping my progress. That’s only 1 every 120 miles. Interesting, especially when you consider that here in London less than 12% of tube stations are fully accessible. Nearly 9 in 10 impede my way. And plans to put in a lift at my local tube station, as part of its revamp for the opening of the biggest shopping centre in Europe, were pulled due to cost.
This is a city that will be welcoming hundreds of thousands of visitors, some of whom will have mobility problems, in two years time for the Olympics and Paralympics. London could learn a thing or two from a city like Barcelona – despite being medieval, it made its urban environment much less difficult.
London needs to start walking the talk. Perhaps it should take a leaf out of Barcelona’s Olympic-experience book?
