Micah's transportation story

“Eight-five percent of the world functions without a car. Let’s just normalize public transit. Let’s normalize paratransit. At the core it's about providing access and opportunity.”

Micah is a blind UW student studying to become a high school English teacher. He works for the Department of Services for the Blind, teaching high school students independent living skills. He moved from Kent to Seattle and finds the University District is much more accessible for him. He gets around mainly by walking, but takes the bus if it is too far to walk. Micah can now walk to most places he needs to go. But his family is in the SeaTac/Des Moines area and it takes him two hours to visit. He used to go down and spend the night because he didn’t want to have to catch public transit in the dark when the buses run less often. He knows that some blind people prefer paratransit because they feel overwhelmed using the bus and light rail, but he found the paratransit application process too complicated. The biggest barriers he sees have to do with finances, seeing people having to move farther from the city to afford living, and those places don’t have good transportation or other resources.

“In some countries it’s very normalized for people who are blind to go into trades such as massage therapy, so that they can be an active contributing member of society. It’s not complicated, it's providing the access. They even have sidewalks that are tactile. The whole system is made to be accessible to everyone.”

This story was originally published to Disability Rights Washington's Transportation Access Story Map. For more stories, please visit: https://www.disabilityrightswa.org/storymap/