As the City of Ottawa's e-scooter pilot nears completion, the CNIB Foundation has been conducting consultations with the sight loss community to gather feedback about their experiences with the project. This is largely in response to the absence of any robust public consultation between the City of Ottawa and the disability community, outside of two presentations to the City's Accessibility Advisory Committee from the e-scooter companies in February and September 2020.
We have been deeply concerned by articles (one of which recently published in the Toronto Star) that advertise the pilot as a success, without reference to the experiences of our most vulnerable residents – seniors and people living with disabilities in Ottawa.
According to the 2017 Canadian Survey on Disability, 5.4 per cent of Canadians are blind or partially sighted, and 22.5 per cent of Canadians live with a disability. As of the 2016 Census, that would mean there are 53,751 Ottawa residents with sight loss and 223,838 living with a disability.
It is also unclear what criteria the City of Ottawa is using to determine whether the pilot should be extended next year, outside of ridership numbers and complaint numbers, which only represent a small fraction of the issues at hand as raised in our deputation to the City’s Transportation Committee for their meeting on June 3, 2020.
In October, the CNIB Foundation, the Alliance for the Equality of Blind Canadians, and the Canadian Council of the Blind (Ottawa Chapters) hosted a town hall for people with sight loss to share their experiences with the e-scooter pilot. Unsurprisingly, we heard many concerning accessibility challenges, including dangerously parked e-scooters on the sidewalk, pedestrians who are blind or partially sighted being injured by people riding on the sidewalk, and the huge impact this has on people's feelings of confidence and personal safety when navigating around Ottawa.
“If, as a country, we are moving towards a barrier-free, inclusive Canada, allowing e-scooters in our cities would be a major step backwards. E-scooters are actual, physical barriers on our streets and would continue to pose accessibility challenges for our most vulnerable citizens," said Ottawa resident Nolan Jenikov.
Fran Cutler, an Ottawa resident and advocate, also highlighted concerns about the validity and accuracy of any data collected during the pilot project.
"This experiment is being conducted during a pandemic where our most vulnerable residents are advised by public health officials to stay home. With fewer vulnerable citizens active in the community, any data collected during this pilot project is not representative of normal pedestrian activity. In addition to this, the majority of the focus group participants indicated they did not know how to report any issues with e-scooters due to a complete lack of communication from the City or the e-scooter companies."
As the pilot project draws to a close, the CNIB Foundation will be submitting a report to the City of Ottawa and e-scooter companies that will outline our recommendations for e-scooters in the City of Ottawa. We strongly urge the City of Ottawa to conduct further consultations with the disability community and affected stakeholders to ensure that whatever decision the City makes does not create additional barriers for the Ottawa community.
Contact
Kathleen Forestell
Lead, Advocacy and Community Outreach (Ontario East)
CNIB Foundation
Kathleen.Forestell@cnib.ca
T: 343-998-6811