Visual Impairment Workshop

I never really realized how lucky I am not to be completely blind and how bad my eye sight actually is. It was a bit comical to look through four layers of plastic, which simulates being legally blind, only to find that my eye sight without my glasses or contacts is worse. So today I discovered I'm way past legally blind! Walking through the CUB in sunglasses covered in Vaseline was quite an experience. I really appreciated even lighting and contrast in color. The lights on the ceiling put a glare on the floor in such a way that it looked like the floor had several holes in it. A more even lighting system would have been much appreciated. The bathroom lighting was good except that when I walked in the door I was confronted with darkness before seeing any light. There was no braille on the sign to the bathroom either. When attempting to ride the elevator, my partner almost pushed the fire button on the key pad because it is the same shape and size and the up and down buttons. The buttons in the elevator were hard to see because there wasn't much contrast between the silver buttons and the numbers on them. The ATMs were surprisingly easy to understand because of the light surrounding the card swipe and colored buttons for enter and cancel. It would have been nice to have braille on the key pad though. The doors into the Bookie seemed hazardous, the glass doors next to the glass windows were confusing, I wasn't sure what was a space to walk through and what was a window, running into glass would have been horrible. One of my classmates pointed out that the stairs were hard to understand because there was no contrast between what was a step and what was a floor which was a major tripping hazard. I also tripped a bit on a tile that wasn't flush, which shows importance in proper floor installation. Overall I learned that the best thing to help those who are visually impaired is contrast and even lighting. Those two things are aspects I will be sure to incorporate into my design.