104: Addressing Barriers: Expanding the Reach of Trails

September 21, 2022

11:00AM - 12:00PM

People who have been marginalized tend to spend less time outdoors, both for recreation and transportation. We see that disparity as a failure of design – where outdoor spaces have not been designed to accommodate those communities and make them feel safe and welcomed, and where the geographic distribution of amenities tends to favour more privileged communities. Trails are an opportunity to rectify those inequities, expanding access to outdoor recreation through safe, welcoming facilities, prioritizing neighbourhoods that will garner the most impact.

The presentation will discuss how the design of accessible, all-ages, and all-abilities trails can better support New Canadians, people with physical or cognitive challenges, gender, race, and low-income residents move through their community for both recreation and utilitarian purposes. We will discuss how applying principles of universal design can create trail networks that support and foster community health, social cohesion, and access to opportunities by expanding the availability of inexpensive multi-modal travel.

While there is a range of design standards and applications that can be applied to remove barriers and foster trail use, each community is different. It is critical to engage those with lived experiences of those challenges and how employing equitable engagement tactics can build better trails.
The presentation will address the following topic areas:

• Expanding the focus beyond addressing physical barriers to include social, economic, and cognitive challenges.
• Recognizing the role recreational trails play in utilitarian mobility and improving equitable access to community assets; how these should factor in how we access locations for trail networks.
• Facilitating a range of challenges and quantifying and communicating those experiences to potential users.
• Path of travel, recreational trail, wilderness trail and how they function within AODA standards.
• Leveraging technology to help remove barriers.
• How locations and frequencies of trail amenities can remove barriers – and address costs of enhanced infrastructure.

Speakers