Accessible-to-All Cities. A Project of Networking Italian Experiences to Raise Awareness and Promote Universal Design.

Abstract

In 2016 the Italian National Institute of Urban Planning (INU) launched the project Accessible-to-all Cities, aimed at fostering the creation of an inclusive environment for improving universal accessibility to places and services at both scales of the city and the territory, by networking accessibility good practices and stakeholders from all corners of the country. Since then, a community of public and private subjects gathered by INU has been established and growing, sharing experiences, problems and solutions. Through the organization of dozens of meetings, seminars, workshops, conference sessions and webinars, more than 200 experiences developed in Italy have been collected, including studies and research, public policies, projects and actions, both material and immaterial, concerning the overcoming of different kind of barriers: physical, sensory, perceptive, intellectual, cultural, social, economic, health and gender. On these bases, in 2019, the INU Accessible-to-all Cities Community launched an open web archive, an initiative that intends to contribute to increasing awareness and knowledge, as well as to facilitate the implementation and development of actions and policies, by leveraging the good practices widespread, but often little known, in Italy.