GPS - the wheelchair kind

When I was looking at power chairs, I noticed some people rigged them up with all kinds of devices. Some were for enjoyment, like people who mount iPods to listen to music. Others were more practical, like the Drink-aide system which helps you hydrate hands-free.

And then I saw the GPS gadgets on wheelchairs. And I thought at the time- great, but that kind of GPS isn't going to show the information a wheelchair user needs.

Trailblazers software, a GPS system, is being designed by students to provide a guide to wheelchair users for barrier-free routes in Germany. Their goal: to create a better quality of life for wheelchair users who encounter dead ends in their paths due to barriers, like steps or other obstacles a wheelchair can't traverse. And here's another link along the same lines.

I hadn't given this whole line of thought much attention since that day until today when I decided to take a lunchtime walk. I went on a different route than usual and found myself on a back road that ended with a dead end. My choice if I wanted to get back the quickest way was not good: go on a narrow road with no sidewalks or through a park with steep paths and not know whether there were sidewalks on that road.

I turned around and took the safe, longer route home. But I realized that even though I know this area, I have no clue what barriers there are when I travel by wheelchair instead of car in most directions, except for a few.

Luckily my wheelchair had plenty of power left and I was far from being in the middle of nowhere, but still I couldn't help but think of how helpful it would have been to have a way to tell which route from that location would be barrier free - and the safest.