Google Maps Now Shows Wheelchair Accessible Places

Wheelchair Accessible Places

Unfortunately, humans began to build houses, buildings, factories, shops, roads, among other things; without considering that not all people can move with the same ease.

For whatever reason, there are many people in the world who depend on an instrument, such as a wheelchair, to get around on a daily basis. The problem that these people encounter on a daily basis is that the world is not designed for them, especially when they go to public places with high steps or narrow places.

Many companies and governments have already started to change this, providing transit facilities for people with motor disabilities.

However, there is another problem with this and that is that there is not much information on the Internet that allows users to know which public places are accessible by wheelchair. Therefore, celebrating the Global Accessibility Awareness Day, Google Maps is introducing a new function that allows highlighting places accessible by wheelchair.

You can now see the wheelchair accessible places on Google Maps

This new function of Google Maps comes through a switch that you will see in the app with the name of “Accessible places” that, when pressed, will highlight on the map the places where you can travel with a wheelchair.

In addition, all Google Maps users (including business owners) can add specific information about the accessibility of some places to help people with wheelchairs.

Of course, for now this function is only available in Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Japan, but Google hopes to extend it to all countries in the world in the coming years.If you are one of the lucky ones who can already try this new feature of Google Maps, you can activate it from Settings> Accessibility settings.

Wheelchair icons will appear in search results on Google Maps. Instead, details like entrances, elevators, and public restrooms; will appear in the site listings. In this way, people with wheelchairs will be able to know when they can go to a place by themselves and when they will need the help of another person.

At the moment, Google Maps has accessibility data for more than 15 million places.

Of course, there are certain places that, for historical preservation or other reasons, are not required by law to improve their accessibility for disabled people.

Therefore, you will not see many public sites highlighted on Google Maps with this function. Even so, we are facing a great initiative that we hope will quickly spread to more countries.

Source | Official Google blog