Assessing universal design principle application on children playground at Lake Titiwangsa Park, Kuala Lumpur

• Main Author: Jafari, Maral
• Format: Thesis
• Language: English
• Published: 2014
• Online Access: http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/51739/1/FRSB%202014%209RR.pdf; http://psasir.upm.edu.my/id/eprint/51739/

The scope of this study includes all children with or without disability specific children with disability issues and the true concept of the Universal Design (UD)principle, as well as the value of playgrounds in the urban parks. The disabled children often face problems when utilising the public playgrounds participating in the activities and enjoying the areas due to the lack of sufficient equipment and space to supply their needs. The aim of this study is to examine the extent to which the children playground in Lake Titiwangsa Park, Kuala Lumpur has incorporated the UD principle and designed with ergonomic in the planning and designing the play equipment to support the all children with different disability ranging in age from 3 to 10. Physical site observations process such as the facilities measurement according to UD principle and ergonomic assessed with photographic documentation were conducted in Lake Titiwangsa Park playground apart from the semi-structured interview with the eleven experts in children playground design involve the landscape designers and policy makers. The data analysis techniques involved descriptive as well as the thematic analysis respectively for physical observation and semi structured interview. The results of this study demonstrate that despite the effort to incorporate the UD characteristics to support the all children with different ability in Lake Titiwangsa Park playground in, the integration of UD is found to be still lacking due to poor knowledge and understanding among designers and policy makers on UD principles and also their negative attitude sets towards the disabled children. The current thesis has not only assessed the physical playground equipment design in Lake Titiwangsa Park in relation to use of UD principle and ergonomic in supporting all children but also documented the comprehension of the UD amongst the designers and policy makers through their cognitions and experiences. The results of this thesis are however limited to the physical equipment, accessibility and the application of seven principles of the UD. Conclusively, this research finding could contributes to creating attentiveness and knowledge to designers and policymakers to holistically incorporate the UD principles as way forward to enhance the development of the facilities for the disabled and abled in the future.