In Winter and Spring 2021, the UCLA Equity, Diversity and Inclusion office awarded MetaMap $8,000 to create a deliverable of accessible doors and their attached entrance paths. The team is funded by this generosity and comprised of four GIS-focused student workers (Sean Woodward, Jared Tadayon, Mollie McGrann and Ada Chung). With the help of our MetaMap Student Lead Heather Chou, other student volunteers, and our MetaMap staff, we created two resources, the Accessible Entrances and Entrance Paths (a.k.a. “Doors and Ramps”) interactive map and a “Story Map” to fully illustrate the project.
The doors and ramps deliverable is a temporary resource as the data will be integrated in the new official UCLA Campus Map (coming soon!). Please note that this information is continually being updated as the campus develops, construction occurs, and more input is collected. Please forgive any delays or inconsistencies.
Story Map
Utilizing ArcGIS’s Story Map platform will enable you to observe the entire project (mapping the accessible entrances, entrance paths, and ramps) from start to finish. It illustrates every step of the project in a chronological sequence, beginning with the EDI funding, hiring staff and assembling volunteers, building the original data set, performing fieldwork, and data cleaning. It shows the incredible depth of our newly collected data. Our data went from three discrete fields to an incredible 17 discrete fields. This data depth will be the foundation for more accessibility mapping projects in the future.
Please explore our journey, data and maps through the:
Accessible Entrances and Entrance Paths Story Map
Note: The story map includes the interactive map as an integrated widget.
Interactive Map
This map’s purpose is to identify all the accessible doors and entrance paths on this campus. We defined an accessible door as one that is wheelchair accessible (no-step, ADA-compliant) and we identified entrance paths as the wheelchair accessible route one would take from the main thoroughfare to the entrance door. We broke both of these two categories into two sub-categories: Doors (unpowered and powered), entrance paths (ramps and regular/non-ramp).
The benefits of this map go far beyond these simple categories as much more information was collected beyond this scope and will be integrated into the official UCLA Campus Map. Additional collected information includes (but is not limited to): slope (estimated), signage, braille, curb cuts, and tactile paving.
How to Use
While the map may look intimidating at first, especially with all the colors and route segments, here are some tips.
Utilize the zoom to get a clear picture of individual doors locations and route segments.
For a cleaner view, you can toggle on and off different map layers: Ramps to Entrances, All Entrance Paths, Entrances and All Accessible Paths.
Click on a door or route segment for the in-depth information on that item (the item will highlight in teal).
Note that the pop-up will give several pages, the other pages are nearby items to help you understand what other pathways and entrances are directly connected to your selected item.
Pictures of all entrances are at the bottom of their associated information page. This can help with understanding the door information and attached entrance paths.
If you would like to share the Accessible Entrances and Entrance Paths map, you can use the share button to copy the UCLA or share on social media.
Accessing the Interactive Map
Please follow the below link to the UCLA MetaMap Accessible Entrances and Entrance Paths Interactive Map built with ArcGIS Experience Builder:
UCLA MetaMap Accessible Entrances and Entrance Paths Interactive Map
Note: MetaMap acknowledges that map visualizations are inherently limited in their accessibility. Therefore, we have a tabular data widget for those who prefer that modality.
For an even more accessible experience we have the full dataset available elsewhere.
Downloadable Static Dataset of Accessible Entrance Doors (last updated 4 June 2021)
Downloadable Static Dataset of Accessible Entrance Paths (last updated 4 June 2021)
Note: This deliverable only includes doors and entrance paths, the “All Accessible Paths” information is still in progress and is available only for rough reference at this time.
Future Goals and Projects
The depth of our data has lead us to aspire to many more accessible mapping deliverables. UCLA Facilities Management in partnership with MetaMap will has begun one such deliverable, to use the paths data from this project as the foundation for creating accessible turn-by-turn walking/wheelchair directions around the UCLA campus that will be utilized by our official UCLA Campus Map.