Guide: making cultural projects accessible for people with disabilities

Culture represents a real chance at a world as normal as possible. The General Council of the Capital approved a guide regarding the accessibility for people with disabilities of the artistic productions made by the institutions of shows or concerts subordinated to the municipality. Starting this year, the performance or concert institutions subordinated to the CGMB, alone or in partnership, will ensure the accessibility of artistic productions for at least one artistic production, of their choice, adapted from their own repertoire or hosted. Making a production accessible requires adapting it for at least four types of disabilities. The project was initiated by USR municipal councilor Sanda Hristudor. The sums necessary to make artistic productions accessible will be provided in the annual local budgets of Bucharest, following the consultation of the performance or concert institutions subordinated to the CGMB. According to the approval report, in Bucharest, there are almost 900,000 people with disabilities, and the accessibility of cultural projects for this public is "a sign of normality". The guide has the following provisions: diversification of communication methods and channels regarding the event; free of charge for children with disabilities and their accompanying person, as well as for adults with serious or severe disabilities and their accompanying person; adults with medium and mild disabilities will benefit from entrance tickets under the same conditions as pupils and students; cultural productions must take place in locations with accessible infrastructure; in the immediate vicinity of the location of the event, at least two parking spaces adapted to allow access to the vehicle for people in wheelchairs will be provided and will be marked accordingly; providing a ramp at the entrance for wheelchair access;

- the travel routes for the blind will be visibly demarcated from the rest of the floor by different finishes in terms of structure, color, sound; in the hall for the event, there will be at least two seats for people in wheelchairs for a total of 50 spectators; the light will always be on on the audience side;

- the access doors will always be open; the audience will have the freedom to move during the show, to change seats and to leave or return to the location of the event; a quiet corner will be set up; staff will be provided to communicate face-to-face with the public to enable lip-reading, to guide people with visual disabilities and to help the public throughout the event; the interpretation of the cultural project in mime-gestural language will be ensured; lights should be warm, no strobe, and any cool light color will be countered by a warm white light;

- the artists must be prepared for any kind of reactions from the public and continue their role; films in a foreign language will be dubbed in Romanian; the animations will be played in 2D format. This is an important step on the road to normality.