The Elevator Pitch: What Elevators Can Tell Us About NYC’s Conundrum for Equity and Inclusivity (p.1)
I still remember my social studies teacher telling me in high school “If you want to see how “good” a city is, check to see if there are any disabled people nearby. What are they doing? Do they seem to be comfortable there?”.
I was at the Met the other day, not knowing how enormous the museum was, I was eager to finish seeing everything just in one day. Exhausted from a four-hour stroll I was in desperate need of an elevator. While tirelessly looking for one I finally came across an elevator but to my surprise a huge line of people with different kinds of disability were waiting for it. From the visually impaired to folks in wheelchairs, leg braces and the elderly, I’ve never seen so many people with disabilities in public, all at once.
A few days later I came across an article from the Gothamist.
According to the Mayor’s Office for People with Disabilities, there are 930,100 people with disabilities living in New York City; that’s 11 percent of the city’s population. Over half a million New Yorkers have ambulatory disabilities, half a million are young children, and 1.2 million are seniors. And yet, only 120 of the city’s 493 subway stations are accessible by ramp or elevator.
The MTA is currently embroiled in not one, not two, not even three, but FOUR lawsuits related to subway access. The transit agency says it’s improving, albeit slowly, and keeps pointing to the “Fast Forward” plan laid out by NYC Transit President Andy Byford. The MTA’s recently-approved capital plan allots $5.2 billion to be spent on 65 new escalators and 78 new elevators, surpassing Byford’s original goals. (SHUMITA BASU, WNYC)
With The Gothamists investigation Xuan, Joy, and I wanted to treat this as an opportunity to check in on some of systemic issues through the art of data visualization.
By using census and MTA data we mapped three things:
- Stations with elevators (red dots = elevators)
2. An overlap of a map of stations with elevators and a heat map of black populations residing in each block in Manhattan (the darker the blue, the higher the black population)
3. Overlap of map of stations with elevators and a map that shows the average income of each tract in Manhattan
Questions like this arose throughout our investigation.
Does level of income and racial demographics impact the when and where elevators are put in at a certain time?
What we need to do next:
- To get an objective view on this map the density of people coming in and out of each station.
- Look for data that shows when the elevators were put in (to get an understanding of which areas got their elevators first)
Cities, planning agencies, and departments of transportation are growing more interested in evaluating the equity impacts of transportation. However, many still lack a clear framework for conducting comprehensive equity analyses. Our hope is to create visual aid that supports initiatives and efforts trying to evaluate the equity impacts of accessibility.
