To make the place more wheelchair friendly, the government have come up with ramps in housing estates, ramps in buses, and more lifts. This is all good. But is there a little bit of design failure in some of these wheel-friendly facilities?

I came across this today. This is the newly built access lift from the ground level, to station control, to station platform lifts that are being erected across Singapore's entire MRT system now.

The ramp that leads up to the lift is too long, and the angle is not exactly tiny either. So when you come out from the lift, one has to do a sharp turn, the go all the way down the little slop. All very easy for most of us. But what about those that the facilities were mainly built for?

Going down may be easy as they will have gravity to help them. It's an altogether different story on the way up. If no one pushes the wheelchair-bound up, it's going to be a quite physical workout for them. Moreover, chances are locals are not extremely likely to lend a helping hand to a stranger, even if that stranger has got disabilities.

If you can tell from the picture, the ramp is not exactly very wide either. So if there is a group of people walking up, the disabled may have to wait, or take the other path down (shown on the right of the pic). This 2nd option is however, unavailable to them. Because if you can see, there's a street lamp right in the middle of that path.

So the government's move to make the wheelchair-bound live as easily as their standing counterparts is commendable. In fact, it is great that they make such a considerate move to make public transport accessible to them so that they can blend into the society. However the truth remains that while the move is admirable, the execution in some places needs more thinking.

Oh, and by the way, I always hear that the facilities are for the wheelchair-bound. Why doesnt anyone mention parents with prams? They have a really hard time travelling with the baby too.