UCL inspires positive accessibility changes at UCL and beyond

Navigating Building Access

How do you navigate UCL and its more than 150 buildings if you have accessibility requirements? Many of UCL’s buildings have multiple entrances and sometimes the accessible entrance differs from the main entrance and is therefore difficult to find.

UCL has been using the services of AccessAble to produce building access guides. The access guides have accessibility symbols that give users a quick overview of what accessibility features are available in a specific building and describe different accessible routes for accessing and navigating a building.

However, the instructions are sometimes not accurate enough to specify precise locations, such as building entrances, and there are no instructions for parks and many rural areas.

A new method to specify locations

That’s why, UCL’s Access and Inclusion Manager and winner of a UCL inclusion award, Pip Jackson, decided to trial what3words, a technology that makes it easier to specify locations by dividing the world into three metre squares and assigning a unique three letter combination to each.

Following the successful, yearlong trial, Pip Jackson asked AccessAble to add the what3words method to UCL’s building access guides. The feature will become available this summer and will provide more accurate signposting information for UCL staff, students and guests.

Making improvements beyond UCL

Thanks to UCL’s initiative, AccessAble will also add the what3words feature to their own guides going forward.

What you can do

Are you organising meetings or events at UCL? Consider attaching UCL’s AccessAble building guides to your invites, so individuals can look up access to your meeting locations themselves.

Share UCL's AccessAble building guides