Universal Design has become part of the language of contemporary design. We reference it in policies, strategies, design briefs and presentations. We talk about designing for everyone, going beyond minimum compliance and putting people at the centre of design. But how often do we actually do it?
Universal Design is hardly a new concept. Its origins go back decades, and the seven Principles of Universal Design were developed in the 1990s. Today the concept appears throughout disability policy, government strategies, design guidance and procurement requirements.
The Victorian Government, for example, has adopted Universal Design approaches across health, education and transport, including the principle that access should be ‘built-in, not bolted-on.’
That is exactly where Universal Design belongs.
Yet there remains a considerable difference between endorsing Universal Design as a principle and implementing it as a design process.
We have become very good at talking about Universal Design
Almost everyone involved in designing public buildings and infrastructure would support the proposition that environments should be usable by as many people as possible.
The difficulty comes when those aspirations have to be translated into actual design decisions.
What changed because Universal Design was applied?
Was the entrance redesigned? Was circulation simplified? Were different ways of communicating information provided? Were people with disability involved early enough to influence the design?
Or did we simply check the design against the NCC, the Premises Standards and AS 1428.1 and then describe the outcome as Universal Design?
There is an important distinction.
Compliance is measurable. Universal Design requires us to think.
Access and Universal Design are not the same thing.
Access requirements are essential. They establish minimum benchmarks and provide measurable requirements.
But compliance does not automatically produce Universal Design.
An accessible toilet does not make a building universally designed. Neither does an accessible parking space, a compliant ramp or tactile ground surface indicators.
Universal Design asks a broader question:
How well does this place actually work for the diversity of people who will use it?
That includes people with mobility, vision, hearing, cognitive and other disabilities, but also older people, children, people with temporary injuries, people who cannot read information easily, and people who may simply be unfamiliar with the environment.
Universal Design recognises that human beings are diverse. We differ in height, strength, mobility, vision, hearing, dexterity, cognition, experience and confidence, and these characteristics change throughout our lives.
Rather than treating this diversity as an exception, Universal Design anticipates it.
Universal Design is not a Checklist.
Perhaps one reason Universal Design struggles to move from aspiration to implementation is that we keep trying to turn it into another technical standard.
It isn’t one.
The seven principles provide a framework for thinking about design. They do not tell us that a corridor must be a particular width or that a sign must be installed at a particular height.
An architect can ask an access consultant:
‘What does the Standard require?’ Usually, we can provide an answer.
But ask: ‘What would make this environment easier for the greatest range of people to understand and use?’ That requires considerably more thought. It requires us to understand the users, what they need to do and the barriers they may encounter.
Universal Design considerations can however be developed to use as ‘prompts’ when considering how buildings and facilities can best meet the needs of everyone. For example, what are the Universal Design considerations that could discussed or suggested when thinking about a sports facility, or an office environment, or a transport hub etc.
The accessible entrance around the side
Consider a public building with an impressive staircase leading directly to its main entrance.
A wheelchair-accessible ramp is provided around the side.
The ramp may comply perfectly with the relevant accessibility requirements.
But is it Universal Design?
Compare that with an entrance where everyone arrives using essentially the same route.
Both may achieve technical access. Only one achieves the principle of equitable use particularly well.
However, in a building retrofit, the ramp around the side of the building could potentially provide equitable access to a principal entrance, if that entrance is open at all times and available for use by everyone.
This is an important point: Universal Design does not necessarily require more infrastructure. Frequently, it requires better decisions earlier or creative consideration during a retrofit.
Can people understand this place?
Wayfinding provides another good example.
We frequently approach wayfinding as a signage exercise. But if a building requires hundreds of signs to explain how to move through it, perhaps the problem is not the signage. Perhaps the building itself is difficult to understand.
Universal Design asks us to consider logical circulation, sightlines, landmarks, lighting, contrast and different ways of communicating information such as incorporating symbols rather than just text.
The question is not simply: ‘Are the signs accessible?’ It is: ‘Can people understand this place?’
Involve users early enough to make a difference.
One of the most important elements of meaningful Universal Design is also one of the most frequently overlooked: involving users early enough to influence the design. This should occur regardless of whether the design is for a new building or facility or a retrofit.
Consultation after a design has effectively been completed is not co-design.
People with lived experience often identify issues that drawings, standards and technical reviews will never reveal. Their involvement should therefore occur while fundamental decisions can still be changed, not when the project is effectively complete.
The role of designers and access consultants is not diminished by this involvement. Our professional expertise becomes stronger when it is informed by the experience of the people who will use what is designed.
What did we do differently?
Perhaps this should become the test of whether Universal Design has actually been implemented.
At the completion of a project, don’t just ask: ‘Does it comply?’
Ask: ‘What was done differently because we applied Universal Design?’
Perhaps circulation was simplified. Perhaps an entrance was redesigned. Perhaps information is now communicated visually and audibly. Perhaps consultation identified a barrier that otherwise would have been constructed.
The outcome will differ from project to project.
But there should be an outcome.
From Talking to Doing
Perhaps the greatest challenge for Universal Design is not that we do not understand it. It is that we have become much better at talking about it than doing it.
Stephen Hawking, one of the world’s great theoretical physicists, lived for decades with motor neurone disease. He once reflected on humanity’s extraordinary ambitions for space exploration, before bringing the issue sharply back to everyday life:
‘But meanwhile, we would like to get to the supermarket, the cinema and restaurants.’
There is something both humorous and deeply uncomfortable in that observation.
We can design spacecraft capable of travelling millions of kilometres. We can build extraordinarily complex transport systems, hospitals, universities, sporting venues and cities. We now have technologies that would have been unimaginable only a generation ago.
Yet a person can still arrive at a building and be unable to enter it.
They can still arrive at a railway station and find the lift out of service with no practical alternative.
They can encounter information they cannot see, hear or understand.
They can find that the accessible entrance is around the back, the accessible route is considerably longer, or that something described as accessible technically complies but is extraordinarily difficult to use.
These are rarely problems caused by an absence of knowledge.
We know how to design better.
We have access standards, guidelines, research, Universal Design principles and, most importantly, decades of lived experience from people with disability and other access challenges due to human diversity telling us what works and what does not.
The issue is whether we consistently translate that knowledge into action.
That brings me to another remarkable Australian who lived with motor neurone disease, Neale Daniher.
Daniher was fond of saying: ‘When all is said and done, more is said than done.’
Perhaps there could be no better challenge to those of us who advocate for Universal Design.
Universal Design appears in our policies.
It appears in our strategies.
It appears in project briefs, government commitments, conference presentations and organisational values.
We say that we design for everyone. We say that we value inclusion. We say that people with lived experience should be involved in decisions that affect them. We say that access should be considered from the beginning rather than added at the end.
There is now plenty said.
The question is: what have we done?
For every project that claims to embrace Universal Design, perhaps we should be able to answer one very simple question:
What did we actually do differently because of it?
If we cannot identify anything, if no design decision changed, no barrier was removed, no user experience improved and no person with lived experience influenced the outcome then perhaps we have not implemented Universal Design at all.
We have simply talked about it.
After decades of discussion about Universal Design, the next step is not another definition, another principle or another commitment.
It is implementation.
Because ultimately, our diverse community does not experience our policies, strategies or good intentions.
We experience what we build.
(Ms) Joe Manton, Director Access Institute