Fixing Up Parliament Hill

By Kate Heartfield

Access to government is now a little easier for Canadians with disabilities -- at least in a physical sense.

Parliament Hill has become easier to navigate for people with mobility-related disabilities. The changes are happening without any red tape or partisan wrangling. It’s all because one man challenged government to think simply, and another man took up the challenge.

It began quietly enough, at the Ottawa 20/20 summit in the spring of 2001. The city hosted lobby groups and various experts at a conference designed to create a vision for Ottawa’s growth over the next two decades. One of the people in attendance was Charles Matthews, the founder and president of a new group called Disabled and Proud, which had just formed to fight Ottawa’s Para Transpo (the city’s parallel transit system) strike.

The group’s goal is to fight for practical improvements to quality of life for people with disabilities. Its only political goal is the establishment of a federal disability act, and disability acts in all provinces and territories. One of the most glaring problems, Matthews says, is the lack of accessibility in government buildings.

"Right now it depends on good will," says Matthews. "Because there is no act, we have to work on all these little separate issues. If there was an act, they’d be forced to make these changes."

So Matthews stood up at the city’s summit and challenged Public Works and Government Services Canada and the National Capital Commission to "act as if there is a disability act in place."

When the civil servants and politicians asked Matthews for an example, he didn’t have to think long.

"We pointed out that the worst possible handicapped ramp is at the entrance to the House of Commons," says Matthews with a rueful laugh. "That was repaired within 72 hours."

Public Works responded quickly to Matthews’ criticism. The curbside ramp he mentioned, and a few others around it, were redone with fresh asphalt and bright yellow paint. Matthews received a phone call soon after the summit discussion from Brian Cooke, Parliament Hill’s property manager, asking him to do a feasibility study of the Hill grounds.

Matthews and Jean Wyatt, the co-founder of Disabled and Proud, toured the grounds with Cooke, in their motorized scooters.

"We found over 80 items just on the grounds," says Matthews.

Many of these items were simple, and related to the fact that Parliament Hill has seen a lot of traffic in its time: cracked pavement, for example.

"The issues that were seen as a safety concern were the first priority," says Pierre T‚otonio, a spokesperson for Public Works.

There were also some sidewalks that ended abruptly, and no one had thought to mark the change for people who are seated and might not see it. Matthews acquainted Cooke with traffic engineering conventions familiar to many people with disabilities, such as using three yellow dots to mark the end of a sidewalk, or placing curb cuts opposite each other on roads.

One road, between Centre Block and West Block, had a curb cut on one side but nothing on the other, so someone in a wheelchair or scooter would be forced to travel on the road with the traffic. There is no path up to some of the statues on the Hill. These changes will take a little longer to fix than the ramps and signage, says Cooke, but none of them is impossible.

There are also some flaws in the changes Public Works already made; the ramp that Matthews was so happy to see fixed still has a little dip in it that might be treacherous to a scooter wheel.

Cooke points out that everything on the Hill met all building codes, but says that often it takes a run-through by the people using the facilities to find the flaws. It’s like a ship, he says, that needs a first run to find the leaks in the hull.

"We just weren’t aware of the problems," he says. "I’m learning from Mr. Matthews."

Matthews took Cooke on a tour of the outdoor-access men’s washroom, and showed Cooke that anyone using a wheeled mobility aid would have to do an eight-point turn to manoeuvre into a stall. While the main entrance to the washroom had a hydraulic door opener, the stalls did not, making the process very difficult for someone with upper-body mobility problems. Once inside the stall, the flush handle was obstructed by a pointless guard rail, and the toilet was too low for anyone transferring from a wheelchair. Wyatt showed Cooke similar problems in the women’s washroom. With just a few adjustments, such as removing the guardrails from toilets and moving urinal privacy guards, the washrooms are now much easier to navigate, even with a line-up of impatient tourists at one’s back.

"All of this is really low-tech and low-budget," says Cooke. "None of it was very onerous."

Matthews says the whole package he recommended will probably cost less than $500,000. While most of the changes have already been made, the long-term changes will probably happen bit by bit, as the Hill undergoes an unrelated, 20-year renovation to restore certain heritage features and make the Hill more user-friendly for tourists, civil servants and politicians.

Access issues on the Hill have been studied before, and mentioned by a Special Committee on the Disabled and Handicapped in 1981, and by the Parliamentary Buildings Advisory Council that submitted its report to the House of Commons this year. But it didn’t take any committees or studies to make changes -- just a will and a willingness to learn.

The next step, Matthews says, is to go inside. Cooke called him to set up a time to do a similar study inside all three buildings that make up Parliament Hill, but they were interrupted by the terrorist attacks in the United States. Once things quiet down, both men say they’ll go inside, and see what else they can fix up.

"We are committed to ensuring that the Hill remains accessible to all Canadians and international visitors," says T‚otonio.

(Kate Heartfield is a freelance writer living in Ottawa, Ontario.)