Accessibility in Soccer Stadiums - CyberLeninka

Available online at www.sciencedirect.com

ScienceDirect Procedia Manufacturing 3 (2015) 5557 – 5561

6th International Conference on Applied Human Factors and Ergonomics (AHFE 2015) and the Affiliated Conferences, AHFE 2015

Accessibility in Soccer Stadiums: Infrastructure and Organization in Support of People with Reduced Mobility - A Use Analysis Sidney Yazigi*, Adson Eduardo Resende, Rosa Yazigi Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais/UFMG -Av. Antônio Carlos,6627. Escola de Engenharia-Departamento de Engenharia de Produção – Laboratório de Ergonomia. Bloco 1/Sala 3102. CEP 31270-901- Belo Horizonte /Minas Gerais – Brasil.

Abstract Objective: To understand how the disabled, or rather People with Reduced Mobility (PRM), face barriers to accessing, arriving at, and using stadium facilities and constructed areas that should attempt to ensure accessibility. Background: Due to the current state of usability of space and equipment in terms of accessibility, soccer stadiums and gyms [regulated by the Brazilian Association of Technical Standards (ABNT) and the FédérationInternationale de Football Association (FIFA)] responded to demands for accessibility by adapting projects reflecting the reality of Brazilian soccer stadiums. Although older structures, they seek to meet the needs of PRM. Nevertheless, these stadiums created obstacle for users by generally offering reduced usability. Method: To find elements for understanding stadiums’ accessibility, we used Activity Analysis as a methodology. Most ergonomics publications from French-speaking countries call Activity Analysis the core of the foundations and the methodological approach called Ergonomic Work Analysis (EWA). Results: Based on the use of accessible stadium infrastructure by people with disabilities, we identified intercurrences in the use of apparatuses, equipment and constructed areas, as well as in the organizational sphere: in the use of care services for PRM, game day support and information provided by stadium administrators. Conclusion: These conclusions are limited responses overall in continuing efforts to improve access and to reduce organizational, physical and other types of barriers in sports facilities. However, raising these questions will contribute to new projects being rethought and to the importance of expanding the concept of accessibility. © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license © 2015 The Authors.Published by Elsevier B.V. (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review underresponsibility responsibilityofofAHFE AHFEConference Conference. Peer-review under Keywords:Accessibility;constructed areas; stadiums; disabled; activity analysis;ergonomic work analysis

*Corresponding author. Tel.: +55 (31) 9213-6610.

E-mail address:[email protected]

2351-9789 © 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/). Peer-review under responsibility of AHFE Conference doi:10.1016/j.promfg.2015.07.731

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Sidney Yazigi et al. / Procedia Manufacturing 3 (2015) 5557 – 5561

1. Objective Accessibility aims to ensure access to, approach to, and the ability to universally use facilities and surrounding spaces securely and autonomously. Thus, incorporating the idea that people with reduced mobility are also included in the context of displacement and approach to the desired object or location makes all projects create favorable conditions when taking an interest in individuals with limitations to reaching their planned destinations, whether accompanied or not, and with or without the help of orthoses. This study will show how people with reduced mobility-PRM (disabilities) face barriers to access, approach, use, and operate facilities and areas within stadiums that should ensure accessibility. This will be a contribution to understanding the concept of accessibility for those involved in the 2014 Soccer World Cup in Brazil. 2. Background Due to current usability conditions of the space and facilities in terms of accessibility, soccer stadiums and sports arenas - generally regulated by the Brazilian Association of Technical Standards ABNT-NBR/9050 [1] and the FédérationInternationale de Football Association/FIFA [2] - responded to demands for accessibility by adapting projects to the reality of Brazilian soccer stadiums. Although these structures are older, they have been upgraded to incorporate the needs of People with Reduced Mobility (PRM). Nevertheless, these stadiums have imposed functional obstacles for their users, generally offering reduced usability. Although there are clear rules guiding the design of accessible features for people with reduced mobility, those rules have generally proven insufficient to face the actual demands for PRM to use those spaces. Therefore, where descriptions in item 8.2, ABNT/NBR-9050 and most FIFA instructions come together should be considered a starting point for understanding stadium accessibility rules. 2.1. PRM- Social actor and object of study This study involved people with disabilities, or rather people with reduced mobility (PRM), and three existing sports stadiums: Arena do Jacaré in SeteLagoas, a city in Minas Gerais; and Mineirão and Mineirinho, both in Belo Horizonte, capital of the state of Minas Gerais in Brazil. The Mineirão will be Minas Gerais’s sole representative in the 2014 Soccer World Cup and is one of the oldest soccer stadiums that has tried to adapt to PRM’s needs. Thus, even with all of the rules and regulations, projects to adapt stadiums or make them accessible have facilitated only partial access and autonomy for people with reduced mobility. Distortions caused by not knowing how these spaces would actually be used during the projects. "(...) I don’t complain about access too much, but because I use crutches, the area reserved for me doesn’t meet my needs! It’s not suitable for me! Then I have to go down the stairs and stay in the general seating area!" Merchant, age 45, disabled.Spectator in the Arena dos Jacaré, SeteLagoas, Minas Gerais, Brazil. According to Yazigi[3], access (be it physical, visual or symbolic) should be a fundamental condition for public space to not be restricted by project limitations that do not take people with strollers and wheelchairs, among other conditions, into consideration. Accessibility is constituted by alternatives for using areas that respect the needs of people with different types of disabilities. It provides suitable conditions of availability, connection, comfort, proximity, and convenience - all in accord with administrative organization, the facilities’ layout and characteristics, components, furniture, and equipment. Through environmental accessibility, the use of buildings and urban spaces occurs actively, which is to say spontaneously, independently, and autonomously. Accessibility should be considered in all of its aspects, as Guimarães [4] concluded. “Accessibility also has to do with sensitivity, with not treating people with pity, as being unable, incapable of deciding anything. Because, in part, when they deal with accessibility, they don’t bother to ask about people who use wheelchairs." Lawyer, age 40, disabled. Spectator at the Mineirão soccer stadium, Belo Horizonte, Minas Gerais, Brazil. Usability and user opinion, in particular, should be included in project quality indicators Voordt[5]. According to Voordt, there is a high level of consensus on the importance of functional quality in architectural design.


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Currently, 14.9% of Minas Gerais’s population has some disability. The figure for the capital, Belo Horizonte, is 12.4%. The World Health Organization - WHO [6] has been changing its concepts in order to focus on individuals’ skills rather than on their disabilities. According to both the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) and WHO’s concept of health, to consider an individual "healthy", that people must be able to interact appropriately with the environment in which they are inserted. This includes transportation, housing, and leisure, among others. Thus, making the environment adequate to promote functionality and autonomy for one or more individuals, regardless of what makes them “less able”, is essential to a person’s health and quality of life. In order for people with reduced mobility to function as citizens in public spaces and structures, including those for sports entertainment, we must neutralize their functional disadvantage. Accessibility plays a fundamental role in inclusion. Environmental barriers, which we see in the form of physical barriers - such as access exclusively by stairs, doors and narrow passages, and the lack of adequate information, among others - are difficulties encountered by people with varied physical and/or health conditions preventing them from exercising their role as citizens. They are, thus, at a functional disadvantage. This, in turn, reflects the adaptation of individuals in relation to the environment in which they find themselves [7]. Therefore, accessibility becomes a process of transforming the environment and of changing the organization of human activity in order to decrease a disability’s effect. According to Guimarães[8], several studies and trials have already proven that inclusion manifests itself by transforming attitudes, behavior, management, health care, and physical-spatial organization over time. Inclusion, thus, manifests itself by way of accessibility. 3. Method 3.1. Material and Tools To search for elements for understanding stadium accessibility, we used Activity Analysis as a methodology. Most ergonomics publications from French-speaking countries refer to Activity Analysis as the core of the foundations and the methodological approach called Ergonomic Work Analysis – EWA [9,10,11]. The official definition, approved by the International Ergonomics Association board (IEA) in August 2000, states that ergonomics is a systems-oriented discipline - now extending into all aspects of human activity and professions - that applies theory, principles, data, and methods to design in order to optimize human well-being and overall system performance [12]. The Ergonomic Work Analysis- EWA is well-structured in its general and operational aspects [13]. Its fundamental principle consists of identifying the “real work”, as compared to the formal organizational, highlighting the practical knowledge (know-how, tacit skills) of the actors in a given situation, the criteria that guide their actions, and the conflicting aims that shape their behavior at work. This information instructs the design process, reinforcing the positive ergonomic conditions and avoiding inadequacies. Specific tools are used in the process of analyzing the activity, such as the census of Typical Action Situations TAS [14] and Reference Situations. TAS are situations that, even after the new design, will maintain their essential elements, which allows one to create favorable conditions in which to carry out possible future activities in the new plant. This situation includes both the objective conditions and the subjective processes, that is, the means as well as the material and organizational tools needed to perform the tasks and the manner in which these are truly carried out by the individuals (strategies, decision criteria, operating modes, etc.). Upon observing the behavior in a given situation, what follows is the self-confrontation interview [15] of the data surveyed carried out by the actors themselves, aimed at clarifying misunderstood aspects of the strategies and validating the observations made by the actors. In the present case, from the project of setting up a new stadium, the EWA made it possible to identify critical situations and to get to know the actors involved, with the poor conditions for access appearing most often in the initial observations.

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3.2. Procedure In order to analyze these social actors’ activity at every step integrating the process of watching a soccer match, we conducted interviews and observations on different days and at different game times in the soccer schedule, both inside and outside the stadium. We looked for these spectators amid the crowd in all access areas, and in reserved and general seating areas. Once we had collected information related to PRM accessibility in the Mineirão, Mineirinho and Arena do Jacaréstadiums, we then defined the different steps integrating the process of watching a soccer match. The typical action situations (TAS) thus defined are: arriving at the parking lot, buying a ticket, entering the stadium, getting to and using the reserved area, watching the match, enjoying social interactions during game breaks, leaving the reserved area, leaving the stadium, and returning to the parking lot like any other spectator. In short, this is the journey a person with reduced mobility faces in order to gain access, approach, use the facilities and areas that presumably try to guarantee access, whether the result of new projects or not. In order to analyze PRM activity in terms of accessibility at the Mineirão stadium, we took PRM there without anyone accompanying them. One used crutches and another a wheelchair. In this way, we simulated the use and handling of facilities and spaces, going through every step of the process. The simulation was based on the census of Typical Action Situations – TAS [14] and reference situations, as the Mineirão stadium was not being used at the time due to remodeling for the 2014 Soccer World Cup. Even with some variables (the Mineirão Stadium was empty and closed for renovations), we were able to gather relevant data about the stadium. Having PRM at the site helped them remember difficulties they had previously encountered and could thus include in their accounts. According to Daniellou[16], a narrative simulation builds an oral account of possible ways to carry out future tasks. The problems of probability and possibilities are discussed collectively. This simulation prepared by ergonomists may lead to reflection about future activities in various design stages. Ergonomists cannot observe activity during the various stages of conception, but they should look for situations in which analysis will clarify the objectives and conditions of future activity. Such situations are usually designated as "reference situations", which does not mean that they are a model of what you want to achieve [17]. In this sense, we should review our reading about simulations. According to Béguin[12], the form directly related to the origins of the concept of use he proposes, called "crystallization and plasticity", is an approach that replaces what is real with a model. First, simulations are designed to allow the construction of an activity model in a given situation. Afterwards, the goal is to provide spaces for maneuver allowing for better actions by the subject on the activity’s object. This, however, does not by itself eliminate the question of replacing the real object. The Arena do Jacaré soccer stadium in SeteLagoas and the Journalist Felipe Henriot Drummond Stadium in Belo Horizonte, known as Mineirinho, were the other structures chosen to analyze PRM activity in real situations, which helped validate the simulated results in Mineirão, confirming what Daniellou[18] calls baseline or "reference” situations. According to Falzon[17] there is generally no strictly identical system but, rather, part of a solution that may be adopted elsewhere. Existing situations have some technical or organizational features of the future system. Recommendations were validated with the social actors involved in the study and subsequently discussed with those responsible for administering the stadiums [19]. 4. Results The existence of gaps is demonstrated by distortions in the projects and adjustments to spaces for PRM. Most are related to limited understanding of space, and elements are used, adapted or not by designers to users with reduced mobility and which, in fact, is seen in current projects like the Arena do Jacaré, Mineirinho and Mineirão. We shall presume, then, that employing the rules and regulations for projects by considering only the technical context and consequently solving the legal terms of accessibility still persists without thoroughly understanding the question of using a particular space or facility for a real application in the context of norm-based accessibility projects’ quality. The results of the activity analysis based on PRM use of stadium infrastructure identified intercurrences in the use of facilities, equipment, and constructed areas, as well as intercurrences in the organizational sphere: the use of


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care services for PRM, game day support for PRM, and information provided by stadium administrators’ websites for those with disabilities, similar to that provided for any other spectator. This case study also revealed that projects do not let users with reduced mobility anticipate their actions satisfactorily, principally because there are not enough directional signs with accessibility symbols in the Mineirão, Mineirinho, and Arena do Jacaré’s parking lots and internal areas. The lack of this type of signage on urban streets, in traffic, and around the stadiums keeps people from planning their routes, especially PRMs who have specific entrances and are, nevertheless, unable to find out which ones to use. Consequently, they have to search for it on foot or in wheelchairs, which is worse in their case. Therefore, buildings and their facilities fail to be fully accessible, reducing PRM autonomy. In addition, this study allowed us to see that establishing the use of a restricted or exclusive environment, equipment, or facility due to the user’s specific physical condition is a bias in designing accessibility projects. Thus, embracing the differences within the viewing public and universalizing the spaces and elements in a soccer stadium causes those with physical disabilities to be socially integrated. 5. Conclusion From the evidence presented in the sphere of stadium infrastructure and organization for those with disabilities, we have presented recommendations validated by these social actors, including information that will contribute to new projects supporting accessibility in sports arenas. These conclusions are but limited responses overall in continuing efforts to improve access and to better reduce organizational, physical and other types of barriers in public sports facilities. However, raising these questions will contribute to new projects being rethought and, finally, to the importance of expanding the concept of accessibility. References [1]ABNT/NBR 9050. Associação Brasileira de Normas Técnicas,Acessibilidade de pessoas portadoras de deficiência a edificações, mobiliário, espaços e equipamentos urbanos, Rio de Janeiro, 2004. [2]FIFA. FédérationInternationale de Football Association, Football stadiums technical recommendations and requirements.4th Edition, from website 2007.Retrieved http://www.fifa.com/mm/document/tournament/competition/51/54/02/football_stadiums_technical_recommendations _and_requirements_en_8211.pdf [3]E. Yázigi, O mundo das calçadas. Imprensa Oficial do Estado.Humanitas/FFLCH6/USP, São Paulo, 2000, p.35. [4]M. P. Guimarães, A Graduação da Acessibilidade Versus a Norma NBR 9050-1994, CVI-BH. 2ª Edição, Belo Horizonte, 1997. [5]T. J. M. Van derVoordt, Quality of design and usability: a vetruvian twin. Ambiente Construído. v. 9(2), Porto Alegre(2009) p. 17-29. [6]WHO. World Health Organization, Classificação Internacional de Funcionalidade, Incapacidade e Saúde, 2004. Retrieved from website http://www.inr.pt/uploads/docs/cif/CIF_port_%202004.pdf [7]C. L. Renger, A acessibilidade pelas abordagens da arquitetura e da terapia ocupacional- sombreamento versus cooperação interdisciplinar para a inclusão social. (Master Thesis) SchoolofArchitecture,StateUniversity –UFMG, 2009. [8] M. P. Guimarães, Acessibilidade: diretriz para a inclusão,2002.Retrievedfrom website http://saci.org.br/index.php?modulo= akemi¶metro=2248 [9]V. De Keyser, Work analysis in French language ergonomics: origins and current research trends Ergonomics, 34(6), (1991) 653-669. [10]A.Wisner, Fatigue and human reliability revisited: In the light of ergonomics and work psychopathology. Ergonomics, 32, v.7 (1989). [11]A.Garrigou, F. Daniellou,G. Carballeda,S. Ruaud, Activity analysis in participatory design and analysis of participatory design activity.International Journal of Industrial Ergonomics, 15 (1995) p.311-327. [12] P. Béguin, Taking activity into account during the design process.@ctivités,4 (2), (2007) 115-121. [13]F. Guérinet al, Compreender o trabalho para transformá-lo: a prática da ergonomia. Ed. Edgard Blucher, São Paulo, 2001. [14]F. Daniellou, The French-speaking ergonomists’ approach to work activity: cross influences of field intervention and conceptual models. Theoretical Issues in Ergonomics Science, 6 (5), (2005) 409-427. [15J. Theureau, Course-of-action analysis & course-of-action centered design. In E. Hollnagel (ed.), Handbook of cognitive task design. NewJersey, 2003. [16]F. Daniellou, Simulating future work activity is not only a way of improving workstation design.@ctivités, 4 (2), (2007) p.84-90. [17]P. Falzon, Ergonomia. Ed. Blücher, São Paulo, 2009, p. 304-322. [18]F. Daniellou, A ergonomia em busca de seus princípios: debates epistemológico, Ed. Edgard Blücher, São Paulo, 2004, p.183. [19]ADEMG. Administração de Estádios de Minas Gerais, 2010.Retrieved from website http://www.ademg.mg.gov.br/