Latest news with #blindCommunity
Forbes
17-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Clothing, Shampoo And Robotic Feeders: Products For Accessibility
Most people don't think about it while roaming supermarket aisles or browsing through online offerings, but for those with accessibility challenges, questions persist: Can I operate this stove with only one hand? Will this button-down shirt accommodate my stoma tube? How will I be able to tell the detergent from the fabric softener? The innovators below collaborate with people with wide ranges of sensory and physical disabilities to design products that address their community's unique needs. Refreshable tactile text and sunglasses that connect you to sighted guides are particularly promising for the blind community. Courtesy of Humanware Ever since braille was invented in 1824, it came almost exclusively in the form of raised dimples on paper that were slow to read and a fortune to print. What about a kind of Kindle for braille, where thousands of dots could appear, then be read, and then automatically refresh into a whole new set of lines? Meet the Monarch, a portable tablet from Humanware with a 10-line matrix of 3,840 pins that rise and disappear to create braille characters, pictures and even mathematical curves from its graphing calculator. (How about a nice game of chess?) The user can jump to a specific page of a book, and an optional external monitor allows others—think teachers—to follow exactly what the user is reading. And while some in the blind community scoff at the Monarch's $18,000 sticker price and the notion that its primary market is schools, it's worth noting that financial calculators cost thousands of dollars when they appeared in the 1960s, before evolving into an affordable consumer device. There are refreshable braille readers—like Humanware's, where pins rise from a surface to create strings of words, and then bing! get replaced by new ones. And special printers have long output single sheets with raised solid lines and curves, such as a triangle or map of the U.S. that blind and low-vision people can follow with their fingers. Inventivio's two devices merge the best of both—and also add audio that narrates what the student or professional is touching. A portable one for younger students, which relies on printed sheets, can help teach multiplication tables ('Find 7 times 8') and that map of the U.S. ('That's Arizona … California … Oregon …') without an aide or parent over their shoulder. A desktop professional model boasts 10,000 densely-packed pins that can refresh to present significant portions of, say, graphs and spreadsheets. 'In the blind world, we have two major problems—one is unemployment, and the second issue is the learning opportunities in school are far fewer for blind people,' says Klaus Hars, Inventivio's co-founder. 'We want to solve both problems.' A climbing prodigy at age 11, Hugh Herr lost both of his lower legs in an ice climbing accident at 17 and received his first prostheses. "I was just shocked by the lack of technological sophistication," he says. "They were passive, without sensing or any computational intelligence." The self-described poor student enrolled in a local college to retake basic physics and math courses. In two years, he was studying at the graduate level, then designing his own prosthetics, and was eventually able to climb better than he had before the accident. "I fell in love with this idea of technology augmenting human capacity," he says. Now, he co-leads the Yang Center for Bionics at M.I.T. and designs biomechatronic prostheses that people can control with their own musculature and nerves, just like their original limbs—and even provide real feeling as feedback via carefully crafted bundles of the owners' own muscles, skin and nerves. His designs have been licensed by medical manufacturers, and are widely known as the first-ever natural human gait using his bionic limbs. Courtesy of Meta The partnership between Meta and Ray-Ban on the what are called Ray-Ban Meta glasses has had a dramatic impact on the blind and low-vision community—so much so that they are the only dual members of the Accessibility 100. The glasses discreetly include a 12 megapixel camera, open-ear audio and Meta's AI. Blind and low-vision people report using them to identify money they're holding, sort their mail, find bathrooms and check that clothes match. "All of these day-to-day things that people take for granted," says Maxine Williams, Meta's vice president of accessibility and engagement. "The engagement has been astounding." Ray-Ban (owned by Luxottica Group) contributes the lightweight, fashion-forward look that Williams says the community raves about. "Style really matters. In fact, in some ways it matters even more because people sort of don't want to be singled out." Recent software improvements are providing more detailed views and voice feedback to surroundings and user questions. If the descriptions aren't enough, a partnership with Be My Eyes (a member of the Accessibility 100) allows the user to share their live video with a human volunteer, who describes whatever the camera sees. Nike designed aerodynamic bodysuits for Paralympic athletes as far back as the 1980s, and today embraces universal design, where products from inception are built to serve all people, not just those with disabilities. FlyEase sneakers were originally designed for a single athlete with cerebral palsy, but the no-laces and slip-in ease also appealed to anyone in a hurry. What started as a successful zip-up-the-back variation of the LeBron 8 sneakers spread into a wide variety of sports lines (including the Air Zoom UNVRS, a cheeky checkered court shoe that opened with a back flap that looked, and was colored red like, a tongue.) "We're all TABs: temporarily abled bodies," says Tobie Hatfield, Nike's senior director of athlete innovation. "Whether through an unfortunate accident, disease or old age, we all become less able. Some just get there a little bit earlier. That puts us all in the same boat—so let's make sure that we have products accessible to everybody in the boat." Courtesy of Obi Robot So many disabilities leave a person unable to feed themselves, from Parkinson's and arm amputation to quadriplegia and cerebral palsy. The Obi provides what it calls 'independent eating,' with a compact robotic arm that scoops up food from four different bowls and smoothly spoons it into the user's mouth—allowing them to sit at a table with others and eat with no assistance. At just seven pounds it can be easily brought to a restaurant or school. And while the device's sticker price is $8,625, insurance, schools, and the Veterans Administration can drastically or even eliminate the cost. (It also can defray expensive caregiver hours.) Families have been known to use GoFundMe campaigns to pay for an Obi in a matter of hours. Few companies are praised more than OXO for universal design—the creation of products designed to serve everyone, regardless of any disability—found in its line of more than 500 different kitchen gadgets. Containers don't need to be wrenched open; they open with a soft finger tap on the top. Tongs can be opened and closed with one hand. From stove-burner lighters to its new pull-out shelf for a clunky under-the-counter coffee maker, the company's products simply make things easier, whether you have only one hand or, as one company executive put it, 'a hand covered in barbecue sauce.' Such products don't make distinctions between disabled or non-disabled users—they're just highly usable products. Primark, the Ireland-based fashion company with hundreds of stores worldwide, is the industry leader in designing 'adaptive clothing'—items with features that make dressing easier and provide fashion to boot. For those with low dexterity, snaps replace buttons and zippers clasp magnetically. For people in wheelchairs, pants can be pulled on, zipped on the side, and cinched by pulling a draw string. (And trench coats are cut short so they don't drag on the floor.) And for people with a stoma—a hole in the abdomen where waste leaves the body through a tube—tops are made with a discreet, easily-accessed opening. All of these items are made in a variety of colors and fabrics, and for similar prices as non-adaptive products. Courtesy of Sam Latif Go to the supermarket, find the laundry aisle, close your eyes, and good luck picking out—literally feeling around for—what you need. To that end, P&G has developed its own raised, tactile icons on packaging that blind and low-vision people can feel to immediately distinguish, among others, different types of laundry detergent, shampoo and conditioner and body wash. The company has also pioneered the use of NaviLens QR-type codes through which cellphones can easily find any razor or feminine product without personal assistance. P&G even makes its icons open-source in the hope that they become universal. 'We're not just trying to do it alone,' says Sam Latif, P&G's Company Accessibility Leader, who is blind herself. 'Doing it on a few products is not as impactful as the industry doing it together.' P&G's accessibility innovations extend to address disabilities like arthritis and limb differences, where making containers easier to open has traditionally conflicted with child-safety concerns. Children with disabilities can require special equipment at school, including adaptive seating, desks, standing devices and playground toys. In nearly every district, if you look at the brand name, you'll see Rifton Equipment. A spinoff of a traditional playground equipment company founded in the 1950s, the company listens closely to therapists and parents, general manager Joe Keiderling says. A recent example: Therapists said the company's tricycle, which featured protective straps and supports, still required equipment (and 20 minutes) to lift some children onto it, take them off if the seat needed adjustment, and then lift them back again, often several times. So Rifton worked with therapists to make the seat adjustable, even with 150 pounds of child on it. Although items purchased for children to use at home are often covered by Medicaid, state-by-state benefits guidelines often cause long paperwork delays. "We meet parents who are just exhausted by the effort it takes to fight for their kids,' Keiderling says, 'and get the equipment they need." Courtesy of Mike Nejat The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this year featured dozens of companies—from sprawling conglomerates to startups—hailing what they described as disability-solving products and features. But few impressed accessibility experts more than Sony and how its televisions, gaming systems and cameras are routinely packed with best-in-class features. Content played through TVs and soundbars can have human voices isolated and amplified to make dialogue clearer, while gamers can buy special PlayStation controllers designed for different disabilities. For someone with impaired vision but a healthy retina—such as the cloudiness caused by cataracts—an attachment to Sony cameras can project onto the retina a sharper idea of what's in the viewfinder. Says Mike Nejat, Sony Electronics' vice president of engineering, 'These features are not just for the disabled community—it's also the aging community, where their vision and hearing are changing as they get older.' With about 32 million mobile, landline and cable subscribers in the U.S., Spectrum has the nation's largest such customer base—but the company impacts people with disabilities beyond their own subscribers. For example, say that a blind or low-vision person is listening to an episode of CSI; they can hear the dialogue but not facial expressions, quiet action, camera panning, and so on. Its Spectrum Access app—free to anyone, not just paying subscribers—provides audio description of what's happening on-screen. Owned by Charter Communications, Spectrum has advanced how users communicate with set-top boxes, including spoken menus and a remote with large tactile buttons, some dedicated to launching specific accessibility features. 'Over one-half of our [accessibility] team are persons with disabilities who use assistive technology,' says Steve Raymond, Charter's VP of Accessibility. 'They're very native and very skilled. Everything we do that's customer facing, and even internally, we make sure it works for everyone.' Trexo's exoskeletons help kids with cerebral palsy and other disabilities walk again. "As a mechatronics engineer, who doesn't dream of building Iron Man?" asks Manmeet Maggu, Trexo founder and CEO, whose nephew in India has CP. Most exoskeletons on the market are made for adults, can't be scaled down due to large backpacks full of batteries, and come with breathtaking price tags of up to $500,000. Maggu set out to change that, founding Trexo in 2016. "We built a prototype here in Canada, put it into a suitcase and flew to Delhi, assembled it up … and it did not work," he says. "I remember waking up the next morning looking at videos of SpaceX rockets blowing up to give myself inspiration." Several iterations later, his nephew took his first steps. Now, hundreds of kids have taken more than 100 million steps with Trexo exoskeletons. The company is restructuring to obtain Medicare coverage for its devices, which will make them more widely available for children in need.
CBS News
04-06-2025
- General
- CBS News
City of Chicago installed to order a whole lot more audible crosswalk signals for visually impaired
Two years ago, a federal judge ruled the City of Chicago violated the Americans with Disabilities Act for a lack of accessible intersections. Now, a new ruling could make Chicago safer for the blind and low-vision community. That federal court ruling requires the city to install a whole lot more accessible pedestrian signals with audible elements. Right now, only about 3% of intersections have them. It has been a legal battle years in the making, and one that is being celebrated by access advocates. Ashley Eisenmenger jokes with friends that crossing the street is the scariest thing she does every day. "Where you may have the benefit of looking at the little walking person or stop hand, I can't see those things," said Eisenmenger, an advocate for the blind. APS, or accessible pedestrian signals, will now be popping up at more signalized intersections. Such signals notify pedestrians of crossing information in formats that do not require sight. A federal judge has ordered the city of Chicago equip about 70% of intersections with the audible crossing cues over the next decade, and 100% over the next 15 years. "It's a long time coming," said Eisenmenger. "There are so many other cities that have extensive grids of APS throughout, and Chicago is really behind on that." Right now, only 85 of Chicago's estimated 2,800 signalized intersections have APS, according to the city and attorneys with the group Disability Rights Advocates, who filed the lawsuit. "The reason we brought this case was because of those numbers," said Rachel Weisberg, an attorney with Disability Rights Advocates. Weisberg said there were even fewer APS systems when the lawsuit was filed in 2019. "This is a huge victory for access for all Chicagoans, and especially blind pedestrians in Chicago," she said. The Chicago Department of Transportation said APS are incorporated into all new traffic installations "It's going to make it a lot safer and easier," said Ray Campbell, president of the Illinois Council of the Blind. Campbell is a plaintiff in the lawsuit. He said other cities should take note of the ruling. "The courts are not in your favor on this, and you need to buckle down and really start to consider involving your blind community," Campbell said. The court order lays out benchmarks for how many signals need to be installed annually, and even a requirement to prioritize dangerous intersections — which could one day make walking a little safer for those who are blind. "it's really exciting to know that at some point down the line, crossing the street might not have to be the scariest thing I do every day," said Eisenmenger. The city says priority will be given to intersections near public transportation, and also locations where people have already requested APS.
