CAN (LET’S) participated in a key informant interview with BikeMaps.org

BikeMaps.org is a pan-Canadian group of researchers who have an interest in active transportation. They were recently awarded funding from the Public Health Agency of Canada to create a platform that focuses on the pedestrian environment. Their objective is to capture the microscale barriers to walking and rolling through citizen reports on a web-map.

CAN (LET’S) was identified as an organization who could provide valuable information based on our involvement advocating for inclusive active transportation.

Creating Accessible Neighbourhoods (Live Educate Transform Society) participated in a consultation with the Patient & Community Partnership for Education at UBC.

The consultation gathered perspectives from patients and community members on the priority health concerns in British Columbia and how we should be training future physicians to meet theses needs.

The report of the consultation with patients, caregivers and community representatives has now been released. There is also an accompanying video that highlights some of the major issues from the report.

The consultation will inform a review by the medical school at UBC of its social accountability mandate (i.e. the commitment of the medical school to address the health concerns of the populations it has a responsibility to serve). A draft of the report was received by the curriculum review working group at the end of January. It was ‘very positively received’.

Citizens for Accessible Neighbourhoods (CAN) was formed in 2005 based on the need to have an organization to advocate for a transit inaccessibility issue. Our founder, Heather McCain (they/them), was excited to finally have a power wheelchair which would allow them access to their friends, medical appointments, volunteering, and the broader community. At least half of the time, when they tried to take transit, drivers acted as gatekeepers and misinformed Heather that the ramps weren’t operating. Heather lived in Maple Ridge, where the buses only came once an hour, this severely impacted Heather’s ability to access their community.

Heather wrote letter after letter to TransLink with no response. They tried to find an organization who would help but was unable to. At the time, Heather ran a Chronic Pain Support Group. They were discussing this issue and the lack of organizations to take on issues like this. A member of the support group suggested that Heather could create an organization to fill the need – or at least address this 1 transit issue. Heather looked into it and it seemed fairly simple. They appointed members of the support group as board members and registered Citizens for Accessible Neighbourhoods (CAN) a non-profit society.

Following the incorporation of Citizens for Accessible Neighbourhoods, Heather wrote the same letter they’d already sent to TransLink but this time they wrote Executive Director under their name and 1 week later they received a response.

Heather found out that TransLink had a policy that addressed this. They worked with TransLink to ensure drivers and passengers knew about the policy.