Outbarriers: Making visible the points of interest for all, even blind people

Abstract

Blind people lack the tools to go out with autonomy and confidence. The greatest revolution for the blind since the stick and the guide dog is the smartphone. Points of interest, businesses, public services, etc., are invisible to them. Although there are Applications that map these sites, they are based on GPS coordinates, and the maximum accuracy of the GPS in perfect conditions is 3 to 5 meters. 3 meters for a blind person is a world of uncertainty. Thanks to having developed and produced the 1st accessible beacon in the market, now this sites of interest and businesses are visible for all. As of today, more than 300 sites are visible between Madrid and Granada. During the beacon development, we noticed that our solution could be opened for other apps / services, that is why we have developed and released a SDK and API. Thus, other clutural, tourist and security Apps could access to the beacon usage and its aplication for verified check-in (a check-in system which cannot be distorted, as in the case of GPS). We refer to an universal solution that is accessible. One of the recent integrated App is the Mahou-San Miguel App, with more than 75,000 users. We are now focusing Outbarriers in municipalities of the metropolitan area (between 20,000 and 50,000 inhabitants) where the promotion of accessible tourism is among the aims of their strategic plans, in order to offer an attractive offer for both blind people and other citizens. Amongst the challenges we are working on is outdoor navigation by using open databases such as OpenStreetMap and multimodal trip planning such as OpenTripPlanner, as more precise indications are needed for blind people.