Posts Tagged ‘Rampe’

Addendum: Eigude Shame XVIII

星期二, 七月 31st, 2012

对不起,此内容只适用于Deutsch

Eigude Shame XVIII

星期三, 七月 25th, 2012

Inconceivable…!!!

Passing prohibited for wheelchair users

As born-and-bred citizen of Frankfurt I am proud of my hometown, but too much is too much!!

I have read in the internet forum Rollingplanet that a new underpass was built at the train station in Rödelheim (a district in Frankfurt Germany). Looks a bit like an amphitheater.

This underpass is such a political issue that meanwhile a citizens’ initiative has been formed. The “Wutbürger” (enraged citizens) are on their way from all directions…

Amongst other things it was discovered during a job-site inspection upon almost accomplished completion of the underpass that the brand new mighty concrete ramps on both sides of the tracks have 10% gradient.

Ramps in the public area always have to be built with maximum 6% and without transversal slope according to DIN 18024-1 und DIN 18040-1 (source: barrierefrei bauen mit nullbarriere.de)

The result is that the ramps are very steep not only for wheelchair users, but also for rollator users, cyclists and people with strollers.

The city of Frankfurt has proven creativity and has hung up a prohibition sign without further ado, which prohibits the passing of the ramp for all wheelchair users.

You could use the lifts, which is basically right if it would be ensured that these lifts would always be running. I don’t know any wheelchair user who wasn’t standing at least once in front of a defective lift.

Words fail to describe the prohibition sign!
Inconceivable… How can you globally prohibit the passing of the ramps for all wheelchair users!

Passing prohibited for wheelchair users

This sign has no other reason for the municipality except to escape responsibility from an insurance perspective if something should happen to someone.

This is just the start. From now on bad planning will be compensated with prohibition signs.

We met yesterday at the train station with unfortunately only three wheelers to have a closer look at the ramps and to duly celebrate the introduction of this new prohibition sign with a glass of sparkling wine.

Highly illegal, the ramps were passed on both sides. We came to the conclusion that a fit wheeler, somebody with an electric wheelchair, a motor-supported active wheelchair or the help of a companion can surmount the ramps.

The sign does not comply with the road traffic regulations and is mounted so high that no wheelchair user will see it anyway.

An acknowledgement letter and a few flowers were fixed to the new “favourite wheelchair user sign”.


Thank you city of Frankfurt

for the successful introduction of this new

Prohibition Sign!!!

This sign is forward-looking.
We wheelchair users
hope to see this sign more often in the city in the future!!!
Thanks again that the municipality is
so much concerned about the
physical integrity of us wheelchair users!!!

We thank again the city of Frankfurt for the duty of care which is shown to us wheelchair users with this “Passing prohibited” sign.

With best regards from Steffen Löw and Jens Maspfuhl

Kontakt: rollinator@eigude.de

Translator BL

Eigude Shame XVII

星期五, 六月 22nd, 2012

对不起,此内容只适用于EnglishDeutsch

Eigude Shame Part XXIV

星期四, 三月 29th, 2012

At this stage I would especially like to thank my wife, who consistently takes many great photos without which this blog would never be possible in this way.

The long and winding road that leads to election!!!

I live in Frankfurt/Main near the “Riedhof“ primary school.

Since 2008 I visit these premises regularly for local, federal state and Bundestag elections… (see older blogpost).

The accessibility of the polling place was specially disclosed on my polling card.

For years there was a mobile “do-it-yourself wooden ramp” placed at the right school entrance, which according to my perception slightly exceeded the regulated 6 degrees and bridged two steps of a stairway.

I am asking the electoral assistants since years to forward this deficit to the appropriate positions.
I know that there is a wheeler who has to use this ramp regularly.

On Sunday we citizens were supposed to elect a new mayor in a run-off election. Thus I could undergo the ramp test for a second time this year.

Each election has a certain charm for me, if something might have changed in the meantime. This is a good reason to vote ;-)

2 weeks ago at the first ballot my wife noticed immediately that the ramp on the left entrance had to bridge just one step.
The ramp was somehow different, something had changed…???

Actually there was something different, but somehow it still wasn’t any less steeply, or am I misled???

I asked my wife once again to take photos!

When I compared the ramp pictures with those from a year ago, even I was once speechless.

A real specialist has sawn through the ramp horizontally so that it fitted on the one step of the left entrance of the school.
Have a look yourself, although the ramp is shorter, it is steeper than before.

If the person who shortened the ramp or let it shorten has converted the ramp according to the latest mathematical conclusions which I am not aware of, and if today the angle of 6° is something different than during my schooldays, I don’t know.

Just yesterday I came to the conclusion that nobody can be accused for the steepness of the ramp. Angulations like e.g. calculations with old uncle Pythagoras exceed the subject matters of primary school.

If the city of Frankfurt would be engaged one day in the scientific fundamental research of calculating wheelchair ramps, I am hereby offering my help.
I would immediately provide my old set square free of charge.

Are we going to help the city of Frankfurt together with the calculation of the ramp length???

Word problem for you:
To bridge a 90° steep step of 25 cm height measured from the ground, to allow wheelers the civil right to get to a polling place by themselves, a 1,2 m wide ramp shall be built.
How long does it have to be if the angle of elevation must not exceed 6°?
Please disclose calculation method.

Post your calculations as comment, or as usual to rollinator@eigude.de

Maybe I will forward these calculations directly to the Frankfurt electoral office ;-)

Translator BL

 

Addendum to Eigude Shame XXII

星期日, 三月 11th, 2012

I have reported on 26.01.12 (see older blogpost) how I was fighting against windmills similar to Don Quixote.

My windmills were just wheelchair tickets for

Sunrise Avenue,

in the Jahrhunderthalle in Frankfurt (an event hall), which basically shouldn’t have been a big challenge.

I didn’t let up for months and amongst others wrote directly to the band asking why I was ignored??? I am still waiting for a message on their part… so be it…!!!
Meanwhile the concert was sold out!

In the meantime I wasn’t keen on going/rolling to the concert any more although eventually the desired object was lying in front of me.
Yesterday the day had finally arrived, the concert moved a little into the background, I was rather curious if I would be the only wheeler, and how possible other wheelchair fellows got their tickets.

I already saw a couple of wheelchair busses on the parking lot, which made me hope not to be the only frequent driver.

The guys from the Red Cross accompanied me with the lift to the first floor (see older blogpost).

They told me I should go directly to the wheelchair tribune, there were already some wheelers there, and it could get a bit tight. I was also told about the difficult ticket organization.

It was “organized excellently”. A very strong employee of a security company, he made me fear with his figure, pushed me up an extra steep designer ramp, probably there was a sculptor at work, on a small tribune.

The tribune wasn’t big, even for us small people. In the end it was fully occupied with 13 wheelchairs. Later I saw two wheelchairs which were not standing on the tribune and wouldn’t have fit onto it either!!!

I don’t know how many more fellow wheelers were standing in the audience, but the companion had to stand among the pedestrian crowd due to lack of space.

For rehabilitation purposes I have to admit that the guys on stage in front – although they can’t write e-mails – are real stage hogs, and I have seen/heard a great rock concert.

After the concert as usual it got a bit cramped in the crowd. On a bistro table in the crowd there stood a giant with estimated shoe size 46. I dared to struggle through the crowd with my wheelchair exactly where he stood.

He didn’t bother to take his splendid foot out of the way by only 5 cm and send a contemptuous look downwards.

I looked up, grinned and said to him:

I will make myself small!!!

Then he took the foot away ;-)

Translator BL

Wheelchair Tuning Part XXX (Competitor)

星期日, 二月 12th, 2012

That standard wheelchairs, snow and sand are not the best friends is not really the insight of the day.

The low budget mountainbike wheelchair tyres
(see older blog post),

constructed by myself are indeed a big relief for me on bad ground conditions, but the small front tyres are for sand and snow by far the worst solution.

Well, with some special skating wheels as front tyres you might be able to illuminate the snow, but you are not moving any faster anyhow.

Actually I don’t understand it, but the engineers at the wheelchair companies don’t seem to know neither snow nor sand. Even after longer consideration I couldn’t think of any country which would not have at least one of it. Probably they live on trees, otherwise there would be adequate summer and winter equipment for each wheelchair as a standard.
Some day I will build in old MacGyver manner out of an inflatable physiotherapy ball and a hand fan a mobile mounting set with which my rolling vehicle turns into a ground-independent hovercraft wheelchair ;-)

Until I get there I continue combing through the technical aids scene to see what the colleagues are developing.

I am living in the city, but last year even my hometown Frankfurt was full of snow.

As formerly alpine skiing obsessed who was skiing with 2 meter skis in the Alps still in 2007 (no carving ski in children’s length) I already thought several times to cut my 2 cellar decoration skis in homeopathic pieces and screw them to my wheelchair instead of the front tyres to be able to leave my flat in last year’s snow chaos.

A seating test in a monoski on a fair was quite nice, and I was extremely surprised how stable I was sitting in it, until I asked my friend behind me if he was standing on the ski?

He said yes, took off his foot, I fell over, and the project monoski was postponed for the time being…!!!

Who was it, a Swiss man…!!!

When I read the post of a wheelchair hotel in Oberstdorf known to me I was immediately impressed.
Patrick Mayer, what a coincidence, a wheeler himself from Switzerland, who certainly has much more test snow than me each year, developed the Wheel Blades.
The

www.wheelblades.ch


are small blades which can be clamped with an iron clip anytime easily (even for quadriplegics) to the front tyres of the wheelchair.
The front tyres remain on the wheelchair!!! The binding is individually adjustable.

There was a real expert at work. Look at the Video,
he rolls down a flat ski-slope with these things on his wheelchair. The envy factor increases, ok I grant it to him.
He has even added slide rails to the blades so that they keep the track on the slope. Excellent, chapeau!!!

The Wheel Blades can be ordered in advance from October 2012, I will do it.
To anticipate anything, they might get paid by the employer’s accident insurance at best, or you have a good lawyer at the social court!!!

I haven’t heard anything yet about test rides in the snow board half pipe, and the snow and waterski suitability still has to be proved ;-)

Translator BL

 

Technical Aids Test Week Lanzarote Part 3

星期三, 一月 18th, 2012

对不起,此内容只适用于EnglishDeutsch

Eigude Shame Part XX

星期一, 十二月 19th, 2011

对不起,此内容只适用于EnglishDeutsch

Eigude Shame Part XVI

星期日, 三月 27th, 2011

Today, like every couple of years, I wanted to follow my civic duty and go/drive to the polls.
Local, federal state or Bundestag elections are a must for me as almost professional complainer.
True to the motto: who doesn’t vote doesn’t have the right to complain either!

When I finally arrived at the Riedhof school in Frankfurt after an exhausting journey (approx. 92 meters), I stood already for the third time in front of this steep, dangerous

auxiliary ramp – slide

The perspective is misleading, this thing is steep!

At the first two elections I had already complained at the electoral assistants.
Probably this

climbing frame

was used as a pattern for the ramp.

At this local election the

ballot paper

is a little larger. You are allowed to make 96 crosses at max, which with my finger function can block the polling booth for 1,5 hours.

The unfolded ballot papers hardly fit on to the small primary school tables.

The ballot papers are very popular with the homeless as blanket.

Translator BL

 

Eigude Shame XIII

星期四, 一月 6th, 2011

Some fellow patients who were lying with me in the same hospital room for months permanently stated that I had to go to the sleep laboratory.
My wife has the same opinion, and I agree with her because I wake up every now and then from my own

“slight rattling”.

The Guinness book of records lists snoring of 93 decibel what is corresponding to the noise level of a busy highway (source Wikipedia).

Because I didn’t want to break this record I had to do something.
I got a case from my doctor, a mobile sleep laboratory, that means that you fix a black box around your belly at home in bed at night and wire yourself up. Good night.

Based on these results I was admitted to the hospital.
I had the suspicion that it could be a well-disguised compulsory hospitalization. There might be plenty of reasons!

Sleep laboratory at night, normal ward during the day.
Yesterday I went to the hospital to express various special wheelchair requests. Rest periods, menu sequence…

The hospital already left a permanent impression before I was even inside. At the main entrance there is a great

wheelchair ramp,

but no lowered curb.

Although the gateway on the right side of the main entrance is usable as wheelchair driver it might be dangerous as it is quite uneven and not on grate.

If you get overrun by a car or do a backflip after curb jumping at least the way to the hospital is not very far.

Translator BL

Eigude Shame XI

星期二, 一月 4th, 2011

The recurring

Quarterly 10 € Surcharge Donation

at the doctor is inevitable for me, even in bad weather conditions.
(Translators note: For medical consultation all patients insured by a public health insurance in Germany have to pay 10 € private surcharge per quarter.)
I always feel a bit pressed at the start of each quarter.

Without donation no dope!

To donate at all you currently need a lot of doping merely for the journey.
Before my accident I was often in the alps in winter and used to quite a lot.
But yesterday’s trip with wheelchair to my general practitioner reminded a little of a polar expedition, and that in the middle of Frankfurt.
When I finally arrived against all rarely worth mentionable odds in the street of my doctor at some time, I just had to overcome this

Wheelchair test track type ice skating rink.

Here no snow was shovelled for about 14 days. No snow, everything ice.

The inner desire comes up to chain the responsible person naked to the handrail on the right until the ice has melted!

On the other side of the street there is currently a well-prepared cross country ski run on the horse racetrack.

Translator BL

 

Christmas Party 2010

星期五, 十二月 17th, 2010

对不起,此内容只适用于Deutsch

Flower ramp

星期六, 八月 28th, 2010

Also this year, my neighbour has planted flowers at my

2 m³ concrete ramp

and turned it to a

flower ramp

Simply brilliant, thanks from this side, looks great.

The floridity meanwhile turns into a jungle-like status.
It‘s growing and growing!

Another two weeks, and I need a machete when I want to leave the house.

I was training this situation already in the botanical garden in Frankfurt.

Click on tags “Ramp”.

Translator BL

 

Bremskeil II

星期二, 一月 12th, 2010

Ich bin für die Schneeräumung meiner

Blumenrampe,

die mir den Zugang zum Haus ermöglicht (siehe älteren Beitrag), selbst verantwortlich.

Meine Frau, Freunde, Pflegekräfte, Nachbarn, THW Feuerwehr…,

sind steht’s bemüht meine Rampe schnee- und eisfrei zu halten.

Dies funktioniert ausgezeichnet und meine Rampe ist meistens schneller schneefrei als der Gehweg, der durch eine Firma geräumt wird.

Schaut, was die Firma aus meiner Rampe gemacht hat.

Wie man dem Bild entnehmen kann, eignet sie sich jetzt hervorragend als

 Frankfurt- Innenstadt- Outdoor- Skipiste.

Der Bau einer Umlaufgondel ist derzeit in Planung.

Die Rote- Fahne zeigt die Schneehöhe an.

Wie gut, dass meine Winterjacke einen Lawinenpiepser hat.

Blumenrampensau!

星期三, 十一月 25th, 2009

Meine Haustürblumenrampe wurde aus 2 Kubikmeter Beton mit reichlich Eisen aus einem Stück gegossen!
Böse Zungen behaupten, die Rampe sichert das Haus gegen Diebstahl ab.

Lasst Blumen blühen!!!

Die Blumen hat meine Nachbarin gepflanzt.

Schick oder?