What is the difference between “accessibility” and “universal design”?
“Universal design” is a broader, more comprehensive “design-for-all” approach to the development of architecture around human diversity. It recognizes the changing diversity of needs important to all types of people regardless of their varying age, ability, or condition, during an entire lifep. By comparison, “accessibility” has traditionally focused on addressing the needs of a few people with separate circumstances from those of the public at large, when in fact almost everyone is, over the course of their lifetime, quite able to benefit from barrier-free design, user-friendly architecture, and comfortable environments.
