|
PROBLEM IDENTIFICATION
Bismarck, North Dakota
Police Department traffic safety data for 1996 indicated that a number
of motor vehicle crashes involved wheel chair users. These crashes were
occurring as wheel chair users were attempting to cross streets, most
notably in the roadway between a local shopping mall and an apartment
building offering handicap accessible apartments. Unfortunately, one
of these crashes resulted in a fatality.
GOALS AND OBJECTIVES
To help reduce motor vehicle
crashes, fatalities and injuries involving pedestrians who use wheel
chairs, Bismarck's Safe Communities program—Safe Traffic Occupant Protection
(STOP), developed the Wheel Chair Users as Pedestrians project in 1997.
Objectives of the program included:
- Developing a collaboration
among individuals and organizations concerned with traffic safety
for users of wheel chairs
- Developing a traffic
safety program targeting wheel chair users as pedestrians
- Increasing the public's
perception of the traffic safety risks to wheel chair users
STRATEGIES AND ACTIVITIES
The STOP
program embarked on this ambitious project in collaboration with the
Bismarck Police Department, Bis-Man Transit, the Mayor's Committee for
Hiring the Handicapped, the North Dakota Department of Transportation
(ND-DOT) and individual wheel chair users. After first exploring and
resolving the question of wheel chair users as vehicles versus pedestrians,
the collaboration searched nationwide for a "wheel chair users as pedestrians"
program, which they could replicate. Finding no replicable programs
to satisfy their needs, the collaboration agreed to develop a video
tape which would be used to educate both the general public and wheel
chair users about critical traffic safety issues. The following time
line provides a glimpse of the process by which this unusual project
was developed:
- In September
1997, writing began on the video script. Although the primary script
writer was trained in the mechanics and art of script writing, many
disability sources were consulted to contribute accuracy and validity
to the script
- In the
Summer of 1998, ND-DOT began filming on the video. All actors in the
video were volunteers and included many collaborative members, particularly
members who use wheel chairs
- In June
1999, the completed video, Wheels of Safety, was unveiled to
the public and offered for distribution by ND-DOT
- Since the
release of the video, the film has been shown by rehabilitation facilities
at local hospitals to new wheel chair users, to disability activists
and their sponsoring organizations, to individual wheel chair users
and to service organizations, such as the Lions Club
|
