Access all areas? Belgium can be a challenge for people with a disability

One in six people in the EU is affected by some form of disability - but how well does Belgium fare when it comes to disabled access? The Bulletin investigates with citizens telling us their experiences while experts give a progress report...

It was an unimaginably humid, hot August morning and I was about to fly to California after a year in New York City. In a final act of defiance to the city that had depleted my savings, I’d decided I wouldn’t cough up $60 on a cab and instead would hop on the train to the airport.

What would normally have been an uneventful four-minute walk became a strenuous half-hour odyssey as I walked extra blocks to get to a lift at street level, was slowed down by steep kerbs and almost toppled down one flight of stairs – all because of my, until then, faithful travel companion, my two-wheeled roller suitcase. Drenched in sweat by the time I finally slumped on a bench in the train, I wondered: Is this how it feels to have your ease of movement stolen from you? Is this what life with a disability is like?

Pretty much, says Michiel Desmet, 29, from Berchem, Antwerp. “It’s going to a new place and looking to see, can I get inside or not?” He’s used a wheelchair since a bus accident in Thailand left him paralysed from the waist down two years ago. “You really limit yourself in your freedom of movement by only going to places you know,” he says. “Or, in the case of many people in a wheelchair, you go outside a lot less and stay at home a lot more, because the outside world is really menacing.”

If you think this doesn’t concern you, you’re wrong. Figures from the European Commission show that one in six people in the EU is affected by some form of disability, while one in four Europeans has a family member with a disability, according to the European Disability Forum. Those numbers, disability experts and advocates say, will only rise in the coming decades as populations grow older and chronic conditions increase. In other words, it’s likely that you or someone you know will sooner or later experience just how difficult it can be to navigate a street, a council office, a metro system that was made with able-bodied people in mind.

'Fight to adapt the city'

For François Colinet, 36, a teacher at ISFSC university college in Brussels, the case for a more accessible society is simple. “You don’t have to adjust things because of me, but because we’re in a society where more and more people are outside the norm,” he says. Colinet, who was born with cerebral palsy and uses an electric scooter, says accessibility issues also affect elderly people and parents with prams. “This concerns an enormous number of people. This is not just the fight for the rights of handicapped people, but the fight to adapt the city’s structure to a maximum number of individual situations.”

What Colinet is calling for isn’t a high-minded, impractical dream, according to Véronique Duchenne from the Belgian Disability Forum. “For me, a handicap isn’t at all an impediment,” she says. “I think that everyone, with a couple of adjustments, can be part of mainstream society.” Plus, she points out, people with disabilities aren’t asking for special treatment or privileges. “They’re only asking to be able to live together with others, to go to the same concerts, to be able to do their jobs, to go on holiday,” she says. “They’re not asking for separate services; they want to live in society like everyone else.”

Accessibility is often held up as a prerequisite for people with disabilities to be able to fully participate in society. It’s both a catchall term and a vague concept, but it essentially denotes an individual’s ability to use facilities and services without assistance. Depending on whether a person has a physical, hearing, visual or intellectual impairment, a building might be inaccessible because its doorways are too narrow, or because it doesn’t have audio assistance, signs in braille or easy-to-understand pictograms. In Belgium, rights groups and disability experts have repeatedly criticised local lawmakers for not paying enough attention to accessibility issues and for not recognising lack of accessibility as a pressing problem.

“Accessibility remains a really weak priority in Brussels, and the entire country,” says Duchenne, who has worked in the disability rights sector for more than 20 years. “Politicians draft texts, it’s included in different codes, but they’re not translated into concrete steps. And I can’t really say why.”

Jeroen Lemaitre, spokesperson for federal state secretary Elke Sleurs, whose portfolio includes equal opportunities and people with a disability, denies that accessibility is not a priority. “I don’t think we’re too unambitious in terms of accessibility,” he says, pointing out that Sleurs recently drafted an action plan that, if approved by the ministerial council, will require all ministers and state secretaries to integrate a handicap dimension into at least two of their policy lines in their policy notes. “There won’t be an accessibility action plan, in other words, but there will be a handicap action plan that will extend beyond accessibility.”

Poor performance

Belgium’s poor performance is ironically the result of a major shift in attitudes to people with disabilities and renewed understanding of accessibility, following ratification of a critical UN treaty in 2009. The first comprehensive human rights treaty to be signed by all EU member states, the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities has been hailed as a milestone in the conversation about disability rights, and for pushing accessibility as a critical precondition for people to live independently and fully participate in society.

“The overall objective of the treaty is to give people with disabilities a more meaningful place than they previously had in all areas of society, to work more toward inclusion of people with a handicap in terms of employment, education, support policies etc, and accessibility is a prerequisite for that,” says Tim Claerhout from the Interfederal Centre for Equal Opportunities.

The result is that we’re in the midst of a transition from a segregated to an inclusive model. Where in the past, people with disabilities were by default cordoned off from mainstream society by separate schools, transport services and workplaces, today inclusion in mainstream society is supposed to be the watchword.

Our buildings, public transport systems, roads and services were never designed with the idea that people with a disability might one day also use them – the result of which is that an overwhelming majority of them today do not. “That’s exactly the problem we’re faced with in Belgium,” explains Claerhout. “That we have so much catching up, that there is so much infrastructure to adjust.”

'Downright dangerous'

Take Karl Meesters, 35, for instance, for whom crossing the street in Brussels is a little like playing Russian roulette. During quieter times, when there are few cars on the roads and no other pedestrians he can follow, he has no way of deciphering whether the light is red or green simply because that information is not relayed through sound cues. “It’s just outright dangerous for me to cross the street sometimes,” he says. “And that’s not OK.”

A Brussels-based HR professional who lives in the centre of the city, he was diagnosed with a degenerative eye condition as a teenager. Today, he’s considered legally blind by the Belgian state. Meesters doesn’t have much trouble getting into and out of buildings. Instead, it’s navigating those buildings that’s difficult. A frequent business traveller, he gives the example of airports and the many visual, colour-coded signs travellers have to follow to get to the right gate and terminal. “I become completely disoriented because airports are all about information processing, and I’m not getting any of that information, so I just can’t do it,” he says, adding that he typically uses his airline’s assistance service for disabled travellers.

At the same time, Meesters underlines that he could never lead the life he does if he didn’t live in Brussels. It’s why he moved from his native Hoeilaart in Flemish Brabant to Brussels when his doctor told him he would have to give up driving on his 21st birthday. Pointing out that he lives 10 minutes from the city’s three train stations and at the heart of the Stib/MIVB public transport network, he says: “I couldn’t live more centrally in terms of public transport. My quality of life would incredibly decrease if I were to leave the city.”

That’s a view echoed by Colinet. He estimates that 20% of the city is today accessible to him, but is quick to stress that both the city and society as a whole have made enormous strides. The first time 14-year-old Colinet tried to take a bus in Etterbeek – he used a wheelchair at the time – the driver became irate and called the police. It was the mid-1990s and the driver couldn’t fathom that people with disabilities were even allowed to use normal transport. Both attitudes and facilities have enormously changed since then, says Colinet.

“A lot of things still need to change, but accessibility for handicapped people has advanced more since the 2000s than in the entire 20th century,” he says. “I’m good in Brussels. You can have a good life here. You can get by here; you have public transport.”

What happens next?

Discussions about accessibility often centre on public transport, since it’s critical for this group of people to participate in public life. Stib is the leader in Belgium when compared to other transport providers like De Lijn in Flanders, TEC in Wallonia and national rail authority SNCB/NMBS. Many of Stib’s metro stations have lifts, 83% of its buses are accessible to people with what they call “reduced mobility”, and almost all its vehicles have visual and spoken announcement systems.

But it still has a lot of work. In a joint 2014 report, the Interfederal Equal Opportunities Centre and rights group Collectif Accessibilité Wallonie Bruxelles, for instance, detailed a list of both major and minor shortcomings. Its chief complaint in the 14-page document, however, was that Stib does not have a global plan with firm targets and deadlines to make its network and fleet accessible.

Asked to grade the company, Stib accessibility expert Christian De Strycker declines. “We’ve done things that were good and there are things still that need to be done,” he says. Pointing out that the network spans more than 212 square kilometres, he underlines that they simply can’t respond to all the report’s accessibility demands at once. “That’s just not possible,” he says. “We have to take a piecemeal approach.”

Until then, and until legislators recognise accessibility for the important rights issue that it is, people with disabilities are developing their own answers. Desmet, for instance, recently developed an app with a couple of friends that allows users to view and upload information about the wheelchair accessibility of some 9,000 places like public toilets, coffee shops, pharmacies and banks in a host of Flemish cities.

The significance of On Wheels, for Desmet, is that it makes the outside world manageable again. “The app is really like a personal mobility guide that tells you individually the places in the city you can go to,” he says, adding that he has received dozens of positive reactions from people saying that the app allowed them to be mobile again. “It’s as if your place in this world becomes a bit bigger.”

Practical info for people with disabilities 

One in six people in the EU is affected by some form of disability, while one in four Europeans has a family member with a disability, according to the European Disability Forum. For advice on benefits, consult your local commune, health insurer (social worker service) and social assistance centre (CPAS/OMCW). Parents of disabled children receive an allowance depending on the child’s age and level of disability until the age of 21. The benefit is then paid directly to the disabled person. Other financial help is available, for example parking permits, TV licence and utility bill rebates, housing benefits and income tax reductions.

The Belgian Disability Forum
The forum consists of 19 Belgian disability organisations and represents their interests at a national and European level

Interfederal Equal Opportunities Centre
Fights against all forms of discrimination, and provides assistants for individuals

European Association of Service Providers for Persons with Disabilities (EASPD)
Represents over 10,000 social service providers across Europe

Flemish Agency for Persons with Disabilities (VAPH)
Provides help on employment, housing, mobility and general information

Brussels Support for the Handicapped
An English-speaking organisation offering advice in the city. 02.660.32.25

RéCI-Bruxelles
Help for those with physical disabilities in Brussels

Bruxelles Pour Tous
A website aimed at tourists who require mobility assistance, with information on the accessibility of restaurants, museums, hotels and more

On Wheels
An app which highlights wheelchair-friendly bars, restaurants, parking, shops and more, with options for personalisation. Currently available in Ghent, Antwerp, Bruges, Kortrijk and Hasselt.

Photo: Michiel Desmet © Dries Luyten
This article was first published in the Bulletin Newcomer Autumn 2015