SHOPPING MALLS FOR THE VISUALLY IMPAIRED

Abstract

For this dissertation, the visually impaired is brought into focus as there appears to be a lack of provisions or considerations in shopping malls for this group of people with their unique design needs. A set of relevant universal design guidelines for commercial buildings pertaining to the visually impaired from BCA was extracted and used throughout the various chapters as a mean of evaluation. Firstly, 30 visually impaired were being asked to participate in the survey questionnaire aimed to understand how they feel in shopping malls, how relevant and useful they find the BCA Universal Design guidelines. It was found that the visually impaired generally find the guidelines meaningful. Secondly, a walk through was done in three of the selected malls in Singapore to determine if these malls adhere to the guidelines and it was found that not all of the guidelines were met. Furthermore, it was observed that newer malls are not any much different from older malls when it comes to providing user friendly features for the VI. Interviews were then conducted to understand some of the perspectives of mall management with regards to catering to the needs of the VI and why they are unable to adhere to the BCA guidelines. Challenges identified were cost, space and design issues. From the survey questionnaires, walk-throughs and interviews, it seems that majority of the shopping malls are not providing enough for the visually impaired. Suggestions were thus made on how shopping malls can be improved to cater to the needs of the visually impaired. Limitations of this study include time constraints and low response rate.