166 out of 168 bus stops in Iceland are poorly accessible or inaccessible, reports RÚV. The chairperson of ÖBÍ (The Icelandic Disability Alliance) says that this is worse than anyone would have suspected.
Úríður Harpa Sigurðardóttir, the chairperson of ÖBÍ, says that the results seem grim. The report states that out of all 168 bus stops, 66 were accessible for wheelchair users, 67 for those with a walking disability or arm-/leg- impairment, 139 for people with intellectual disabilities and only seven for blind and visually impaired people. “In many places, the bus stops are nothing more than a pole by the road and there are 18 bus stations that non of the disability groups can use.”
Úríður says the alliance wasn’t prepared for such results. “According to the government’s plan, 90% of the bus stops should be accessible by 2024, and I don’t quite know how that will happen when more than 90% of the bus stops are completely inaccessible,” she says.
The capital city area looks better than the countryside, where all of the bus stops have very poor access. “If we are going to take something positive out of this, it is only very good that this result has come out so that now the government has this completely in black and white, how serious the situation is. They have to take this seriously and start already acknowledging how urgent the task is. Funding needs to be put into this project,” says Úríður.
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