Bounded at the driveway’s edge: body-space tensions encountered by children with mobility impairments in moving about the neighbourhood street

ABSTRACT

Research has shown the neighbourhood as an influential environment concerning children’s independent mobility and activity participation. However, its influence on the everyday experiences of children with disabilities is not well understood. This article addresses this gap by studying the accounts of ten nine-12 year olds from south-east Queensland, Australia, who have diverse mobility impairments. This phenomenological study reveals mobility is a conditional act. Conditionality is understood by the way social and spatial factors intersect to influence one’s mobility about the street – or in our case coerced immobility. The body-space practices also reveal a mismatch between children’s embodiment and the neighbourhood environment, which intensified and converged at the absent footpath, with crucial repercussions for their spatial agency and activity participation. The findings suggest the importance of understanding diverse body-space practices in mobility studies and the need to contest ableism in street design to create inclusive walkable neighbourhoods for all.

KEYWORDS:

• Neighbourhood
• children's independent mobility
• disability
• ableism
• walkability
• street

Acknowledgement

We wish to acknowledge the children and families for their participation, and CPL, Muscular Dystrophy Association of Queensland, and Montrose Access for their in-kind support in recruitment.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

ORCID

Lisa Stafford http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3439-9972

Notes

1 Codes were given to the children to avoid misidentification due to community closeness and assigned to each child and their families for anonymity. Children were given a P for participant and a numeral, e.g. P1. Families were given a letter according to their role, M=Mother, D=Dad, S=Sibling, and the numeral relating to the child e.g. D1.