Safe, Seamless, Dignified
Kate Hunter-Zaworski opens the world to people with disabilities.

Kate Hunter-Zaworski leads a team that’s constantly honing the “trip chain” to eliminate hazards, barriers and awkward transfers — so disabled travelers arrive with both body and dignity intact.

Iused to backpack in the Mt. Jefferson Wilderness,” reminisces Marlene Massey of Corvallis. “Now, it’s a challenge just to cross the street.” Since the results of brain surgery left her in a wheelchair 12 years ago, Massey has depended on transportation services that can safely accommodate her Breezy 600.

Making it easier for people like Massey to get around is the mission of OSU’s National Center for Accessible Transportation (NCAT), funded by the U.S. Department of Education. Under the leadership of engineer Katharine Hunter-Zaworski, experts in biomechanics, ergonomics and mechanical engineering design equipment for mass transit systems — everything from bus lifts to boarding ramps and a wheelchair-accessible lavatory in the new Boeing 787 Dreamliner.

For people whose mobility is limited by physical, sensory or cognitive impairment, devices such as OSU’s patented wheelchair “docking system” that engages automatically upon boarding can make the difference between dependence and self-reliance. Assistive gear lets people move through the world at will, come and go on their own terms and escape solitude and isolation.

Honing the “trip chain”
Three words distill Hunter-Zaworski’s vision of accessible public transportation: safe, seamless, dignified. “These words, these ideas,” she says, “underlie everything we do.” With partners such as Boeing, Amtrak, Portland International Airport, Eugene Transit and Paralyzed Veterans of America, her team is constantly honing the “trip chain,” the series of movements that take you from starting point to destination. For a traveler to arrive with both body and dignity intact, each point along the way must be free of hazards, barriers and clumsy or awkward transfers from, say, a wheelchair into an airplane seat.

Canadian by birth, Hunter-Zaworski began her career nearly three decades ago when she was the first woman to earn a mechanical engineering degree at the University of British Columbia. Today, she and her team, including colleague and husband, OSU assistant professor Joseph Zaworski, have relentlessly pushed the principle of “universal inclusive design.”

Easier access benefits everybody
Examples abound: lever-style door handles, which are easier to open when your arms are full; automatic garage-door openers, originally an assistive device for a quadriplegic; “curb cuts,” built for wheelchairs — and handy for rolling suitcases and baby strollers.

The advantages of easier access aren’t just for the 50 million Americans with disabilities, but rather to the whole community, Hunter-Zaworski explains.

The next generation of assistive devices is already on the drawing board at OSU. Among them are rear-facing wheelchair restraints, real-time speech translation, ergonomic seat cushions and age-in-place technologies for boomers heading for retirement.

An ironclad promise
“Some of the battles I’ve fought for accessibility have been hard,” Hunter-Zaworski says, looking down at the metal band encircling her little finger. “But I wear the iron ring. In Canada, this ring signifies a professional engineer’s responsibility to protect public safety. I take that responsibility very seriously.”