Outdoor Wheelchair Accessible Tables

---- CUSTOMIZED ADAPTATION --------- PURPOSE: To create customized outdoor wheelchair accessible tables for students with mobility disabilities. The Hunter Orthopedic School has 33 students with physical and/or intellectual disabilities from kindergarten to year 12. The school’s existing plastic tables were dilapidated and were not wheelchair accessible friendly. The school wanted to replace the tables with something different that may be supported in a different way making the tables easier for wheelchair users. The new tables needed to integrate the existing large shade umbrellas, which were mounted on metal poles in the center of each table. A team of ten volunteers developed a design for square tables made from timber decking, with each table constructed in two triangular sections. Each triangular section has a central length of mild steel pipe cut in half, which wraps around the umbrella pole. The angle iron frame which supports the timber decking and the struts supporting the frame are welded to the pipe. (The team made a special jig to ensure that all the sections were made to exactly the same specifications.) Two triangular sections were bolted together around each pole to create a complete table. TITLE: Dining Outside. JOURNAL: TAD Journal. REF: Volume 29, Number 3, September 2009: p. 12-13. PAGES: 3 (including cover).