re: #332 Wile E. Wonka

“Stramps” are actually terrible design — although they look great from a distance, and Oberlander and Erickson’s hearts were in the right place when they came up with the concept, it fails to work as a wheelchair ramp (no edges, huge fall risk) AND fails to work as stairs, especially for visually-impaired or otherwise disabled people who don’t use wheels.

uxforarchitects.com

Thank you for posting that summary — matches my reaction to the design, based on several years of pushing my mom in her wheelchair and now being on a walker myself. The person pushing a wheelchair has to go backwards down the ramps, to keep their passenger safe from falling or feeling like they’re going to fall, while navigating over their own shoulder to stay in the right line. The ‘stramp’ looks like a bloody nightmare for that — no rails, sharp corners, cross traffic from the other folks walking up or down. Doesn’t look much easier for navigating with a walker, for some of the same reasons.

Pretty. Not functional.