Accessibility Outreach

Toronto’s streets are vital places that should be designed to improve safety and accessibility for all ages and abilities. The City works with consultants, specialists, advocates and people with disabilities to receive feedback on transportation projects and programs, to ensure that they meet the standards for accessible design.

In June 2022, the City conducted a site visit with people with disabilities at York University to receive feedback on recently-added accessibility features to gauge their effectiveness. 

Some key takeaways were: 

  • Participants with low to no vision shared that generally less is more, and that accessible design should communicate only what is essential.
  • All participants highlighted that consistency of design is important for navigation. People with disabilities travel across the city and having consistency enables them to understand and access the public realm.
  • Lighting is essential to ensure safety for all road users, particularly those with disabilities, especially along multi-use trails in their own corridors.
  • Snow clearance on accessibility features must be prioritized to ensure they can be easily detected.  
  • Generally, a beveled (sloped) edge was preferable to at-grade unit pavers or tactile markers to indicate a transition between different types of infrastructure, such as sidewalks and multi-use trails.

Please see the Accessibility Site Visits report for more information.

The Toronto Accessibility Advisory Committee provides advice to City Council on the elimination of barriers faced by people with disabilities and acts as a liaison with external bodies on barriers to participation in public life and to the achievement of social, cultural and economic well-being of people with disabilities. The committee also provides advice to City Council about the requirements and implementation of accessibility standards and the preparation, implementation and effectiveness of accessibility reports as required by the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act, 2005 (AODA).

The following reports from the Committee are related to cycling or pedestrian projects: